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20 | 24TH - 30TH APRIL 2015 | UTILITY WEEK Sponsored Report: contact centres outbound. So you'd locate more complex customer service queries there, and things like altering payment plans. And experience shows that outbound calling in connection with debt collection and late payments also works well in South Africa. A core UK opera- tion can be reserved for the most complex situations, such as complaint handling, cus- tomer retention and similar issues." That said, stresses Lloyd, the size of a core UK operation can be relatively compact. South Africa, he maintains, is very much an up and coming destination for UK busi- nesses wanting to explore alternatives to a domestic customer contact centre. In short, he says, it is not just about lowering costs. "When clients meet our South African people, they find a genuine customer ser- vice ethic: people want to help, and want to please," he observes. "That's not to say that you can't get those qualities in India, but the South African dimension certainly provides businesses with additional options, espe- cially in terms of instances where customer satisfaction metrics are important." One such area is collections and debt recovery. South African agents have proved adept at outbound debt recovery calls, says Lloyd. They also have a good track record in constructing consumer payment schedules in respect of inbound calls that leave both the utility and its customer satisfied. Moreover, he adds, South African cus- tomer contact centre agents are genuinely proud of the work they do and have no dif- ficulty identifying with the UK-based busi- nesses they are working on behalf of. That is in sharp contrast to the situation with some UK-based contact centres, where low job satisfaction and low agent self-esteem can lead to poor performance and high labour turnover. In March, a survey published by print specialist Solopress found "call centre oper- ator" to be the UK's second-most hated job title, second only to "traffic warden", and only marginally ahead of "sales person". A keen and enthusiastic workforce, emphasises Lloyd, makes it easy for cus- tomer contact centre outsourcing providers such as WNS to offer the "outcome-based" pricing and performance contracts that today's outsourced contact centre market- place increasingly requires. "The market has moved on from cus- tomer contact centre providers simply offer- ing to guarantee a certain level of contact agent availability, along with specified ser- vice level agreement targets in terms of call resolution and waiting times," he explains. "Today, the dialogue with clients is more about business process transformation, in order to improve efficiencies, and about the outcomes that we are delivering." For "outcomes", he says, WNS finds itself routinely engaging with customers on out- comes such as cash collection, customer retention, and customer satisfaction scores. "We're not just selling time, and agents sitting at desks. We're committing ourselves – and our people – to delivering on hard, measurable targets. There's an upside for us, and an upside for our utility customers, who can see a clear link between what they pay, and the results they get." That said, the dialogue with some parts of the utility market is only in its early stages. Most of the UK's water utilities, for instance, do not outsource their customer contact cen- tre activity at all, and may require convinc- ing that a third party using offshore contact centre agents can deliver better results. Mark Wilkinson, collections manager at Northumbrian Water, for instance – which does not use an outsourced customer contact centre – worries about the potential impact of outsourcing on customer relationships. "In our view, collections performance is really about your approach to collections, rather than contact centre location and cul- ture," he explains. "Take too hard-nosed an approach and you run the risk of break- ing the relationship, swapping a short-term improvement in cash flow for a longer-term impact on marketplace perception and cus- tomer satisfaction." Even so, WNS's Lloyd is up for the challenge. "Utilities' core competence is operating a utility: ours is operating contact centres. We have the technology, the skills, the people, and the presence in international locations – and we think that utilities' regulatory envi- ronment is increasingly moving the argu- ment in our direction." Czech Republic • Total office occupancy cost, per workstation, per annum in Prague, was $6,150 per square foot, per annum, in 2012, which decreased by 3 per cent over the last year. • Investors benefit from the relatively low tax rates in the Czech Republic. • The flat income tax rate is 15 per cent, and the top corporate tax rate has been reduced from 20 per cent to 19 per cent. Mexico • Mexico remains competitive in terms of the risk-adjusted total cost of sourcing. This analysis includes all three major sources of costs for vendors and captive centres – labour, telecoms and real estate. • The cost of living is relatively low in Mexico compared to the US, Canada and European nations. South Africa • According to the organisation Business Process Enabling South Africa, government incentives make the country more affordable by 60 to 70 per cent to run a call centre than it is in the UK (where most of its target market resides). • Johannesburg's total occupancy cost per square meter per annum is $247.7 – ranked 20th globally. Malaysia • Although Malaysia offers a competitive wage differential over the US, Australia and Europe, salaries are still approximately 30 to 50 per cent higher than those in India and the Philippines. • The annual attrition rates in IT outsourcing, business process outsourcing and shared- service centres ranged between 10 per cent and 15 per cent annually, and wage inflation was 8-10 per cent in 2011 Produced in association with: Source: WNS Global Services The business environment in top low-cost locations Poland • Tax incentives offered in special economic zones are attracting more multinational service providers to Poland. • For 2013, Poland has improved in all catego- ries of the World Bank's Ease of Doing Business index over 2012. Romania • Start-up business costs in Romania lower than other Eastern European and Asian alternatives. • The country's corporate tax rate is also relatively low. • Rents in Bucharest: $25 per square meter monthly rate. • Labour costs are rising in the country. They increased by 4.6 per cent, year on year, in 2012. • Employees receive about 75 per cent of their gross salary, but enterprises pay more due to high payroll taxes. Philippines • The average total remuneration for a business process outsourcing employee in Philippines was approximately $7,000 a year (based on the data of H1 2013). • Office rentals in the Metro Manila area grew by 9 per cent, year on year, in 2012.