Increasing use of Virtual Cost Centers

The Wall Street Journal reports the increasing use of Virtual Call Centers: “You've heard of offshoring. What about home-shoring? That's a term some use to describe companies' tapping U.S. workers to answer tech-support and customer-service calls -- from home.”

"These at-home workers handle hotel and airline reservations, roadside assistance, tech support and sales calls। Retirees and near-retirees watching retirement accounts shrink may find such work-at-home opportunities a way to earn extra cash."

"Despite the economic slowdown, some of these firms plan to continue hiring। For instance, Hilton expects to hire more at-home agents in January, says Russ Olivier, a senior vice president at the company। Alpine Access will hire 250 more agents this year, and 1,200 in the first quarter of 2009, says Chris Carrington, CEO of the Denver-based firm."

"He says the growth is driven largely by companies moving call-center operations back to the U।S। from overseas -- in part because wages and other costs are rising in other countries, but also because communication difficulties can result in customer backlash."

"The jobs often require some experience. Mr. Carrington says Alpine hired just 2% of applicants this year. And while flexibility is a perk -- in general, agents set their schedules about a week in advance -- many of the jobs are part time, with pay ranging from about $8 to $14 an hour. Many of the companies don't offer benefits."

NEW Customer Service Companies Inc. is expanding its Bowling Green workforce

The Lane Report details N.E.W.'s expansion: "NEW Customer Service Companies Inc. is expanding its Bowling Green workforce and plans to double its staff by next May, putting the company well ahead of its previously announced hiring schedule."

"In May of this year, the Virginia-based company – which provides extended service plans and buyer protection programs for consumer products – announced plans to establish its work-at-home program in the Bowling Green area. At that time, NEW said it would hire around 120 people over the course of the first year and would continue to hire at that pace, creating a total of around 350 new jobs within three years."

"Now, the company expects to come close to 350 employees within only one year. NEW currently has a staff of 160 in the Bowling Green area and plans to add 160 jobs by May 2009, bringing the total number of jobs to 320. "

LiveOps offers free white paper on deploying a virtual call center

LiveOps recently began offering free white paper on deploying a virtual call center. The whitepaper is available here:

LiveOps Whitepaper

Arise is searching for bilingual agents

The Daily Advertiser reports, "A Florida-based company that connects corporations with home-based customer service staff has turned to Lafayette for a growing French-language demand."

"Arise Virtual Solutions recruits and certifies thousands of home-based customer service employees around the country. Operating as individual small businesses, Arise connects new employees with a company they'd like to work for (Arise services two of the Fortune 10 and 10 of the Fortune 500 companies), and based on the home hours they're available."

"Many of Arise's larger clients in retail are expanding their call center contracts to regions of Canada where they sell to French-speaking customers. They've begun rerouting more English and French language customer calls from Canada to bilingual agents in the U.S., said Jared Fletcher, vice president and ACP of admissions and certification at Arise."

Former Yahoo! Vice President Joins LiveOps

The Sun Herald reports: "LiveOps, the virtual call center company, today announced that Eckart Walther has joined the company as Senior Vice President of LiveOps Marketplace. Walther will be driving the strategic initiatives around virtual work in the LiveOps community and will report to LiveOps CEO Maynard Webb."

"'We're thrilled that Eckart has joined LiveOps. LiveOps is at the forefront of a global trend around the virtualization of work, enabled by the power of the Internet,' said Maynard Webb, CEO of LiveOps. 'Similarly to how eBay transformed the world of commerce, LiveOps is revolutionizing the world of work by bridging tomorrow's workforce with today's companies. Given Eckart's background in Internet technologies and communities, he will be a valuable asset in helping us realize our vision.'"

"As the former head of products for Yahoo! Search, Walther was responsible for Yahoo!'s web, multi-media and social search products. During his tenure at Yahoo!, Walther helped grow Yahoo!'s search business, led Yahoo!'s social search strategy including Yahoo! Answers, and drove the acquisition of Del.icio.us. In previous roles, Walther served as a key member of the Tellme and Netscape teams, and held technical research positions at Stanford University and General Electric."