Many companies have outsourced their customer service. Does it affect the kind of service the customer expects from that company? From observation, I think it does.

For example, I know company A, based in the US, to be good in customer service. But when they outsourced their customer service and I call their hotline and talk to someone from another country, I don’t seem to get the warm service that I was used to getting from the company. This is because the principles followed by the outsourcing company may not be aligned with those of company A.

Alignment is the keyword here.

Now, there’s a study done by Contact Center Satisfaction Index (CCSI) from CFI Group. The study reveals that offshoring outsourcing is harmful to customer service.

The CCSI report, released just as the U.S. midterm election campaigns swing into high gear and a month before NBC premieres a new sitcom on offshoring called Outsourced, found that offshore contact centers score 27 percent lower in customer satisfaction than those based in the U.S. Foreign-based contact centers score less in every single category, from first call resolution to customer service.

The biggest argument for repatriating a contact center is the almost unprecedented level of dissatisfaction associated with offshore agents, says the study. It found that contact center satisfaction is only 58 out of 100 when the call is handled by an offshore agent, compared to 79 for U.S.-based agents.  To put a score of 58 in perspective, satisfaction with the IRS is about the same, with a score of 55. There is also the issue of concern by American consumers of seeing jobs being exported at a time of lingering high unemployment.

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