Recession-hit BPO employees 'on the bench'

BPO employees
were once thriving with so many job opportunities, but are now feeling the heat of the economic slowdown, as call centres have begun cutting back on jobs.

In the NCR region - Noida and Gurgaon - worried about actually laying off people, some companies are resorting to putting them on the bench.

For three months, Anshul Kumar has not reported to the call centre where he has worked for two years. Officially, he hasn't been sacked. He's been told he's "on the bench" and his id card has been taken back. He can't show up at work and he doesn't get paid.

"The process we moved to after spending more than two years in the programme faced a lot of issues due to recession. It was downsizing at that time so they decided to put us on bench. Like any other employee, I wanted to grow with the company and get recognition but it didn't go that way. It really feels bad," said Anshul Kumar.

Putting young workers on the bench is one way of controlling costs. Here's another.

A Noida-based BPO no longer offers transport to employees who live further than 45 km away. So employees in Gurgaon and Faridabad, or parts of Delhi like Rithala, need to assemble at a pick-up point even at 3 am.

"Cost cutting is essential today. It's important to be more productive and reduce all the wastages we are living with. When four cabs are going to the same location, you can get a bus to do the same job," said Deepak Ohlyan, president, Business Process.

With the deepening financial crisis in the US, that accounts for 70 per cent of the BPO business, cost reduction and productivity improvement are the two most commonly heard words in call centres in the past few months.

In simple English, that means longer and tougher hours.

Those who answer phones have to spend nine hours instead of eight taking calls, which means longer shifts for answering calls. Administrative and support staff also have to take calls now and vacation time has been shortened.

"Stopping free meals or deducting money for transport, that is still ok. We are still earning, but if we loose our jobs after that due to recession, it really hurts because you don't know what's going to happen to you after that," said Anshul.

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US GDP shrinks 3.8%, most in 26 yrs

The world's largest economy US has contracted 3.8 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2008, the most since 1982, as the worst ever financial turmoil in nearly 80 years crimped consumer and business spending.
The nation's economy which officially entered into recession in December 2007, shrunk 3.8 per cent in the December quarter, according to the advanced estimates from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Moreover, the decline is the worst since the GDP fell 6.4 per cent in the first quarter of 1982.
"Real gross domestic product -- the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States -- decreased at an annual rate of 3.8 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2008," the BEA which is part of the Commerce Department said in a statement today.
In the third quarter of last year, the GDP had declined 0.5 per cent.
Reportedly, experts had expected the economy to shrink 5.4 per cent in the fourth quarter. Nonetheless, the figure is grim considering the worsening financial situation.
However, the BEA noted that that the fourth quarter advance estimates are based on "source data that are incomplete or subject to further revision..."
For the full year 2008, American economy grew just 1.3 per cent compared to two per cent rise in the year-ago period.
According to the statement, the drop in fourth quarter real GDP was mainly due to negative contributions from exports, personal consumption expenditures, equipment and software and residential fixed investment.
Noting that most of the major components contributed to the decrease in fourth quarter real GDP, BEA said, "the largest contributors were a downturn in exports and a much larger decrease in equipment and software. The most notable offset was a much larger decrease in imports".
Regarding the full year 2008 advanced GDP figure of 1.3 per cent, the BEA pointed out that the growth was primarily on account of exports, personal consumption expenditures (PCE) for services, federal government spending, non-residential structures, state and local government spending.
"These were partly offset by residential fixed investment, PCE for goods, equipment and software, and private inventory investment," the statement said.
On the other hand, BEA noted that deceleration in real GDP (as compared to a growth of two per cent in 2007) primarily reflected a sharp fall in PCE, a downturn in equipment and software, and decelerations in exports and in state and local government spending.
Meanwhile, American President Barack Obama is expected to come up wtih an 819-billion dollar stimulus package to bolster the nation's sagging economy and also create nearly four million jobs.

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