Call Centres Move to the Living Room

'Homeshoring' is the new 'outsourcing'

The next customer service agent you get on the phone may well be sitting in slippers and a dressing gown.

A report released on Tuesday from research firm IDC says a number of companies are turning to a new method to meet call centre challenges: getting workers to handle calls from their homes.

According to researcher IDC, so-called homeshoring or homesourcing in certain situations can boost productivity while cutting costs,. The practice also can avoid a potential pitfall of sending such work overseas, IDC suggested: foreign agents less familiar with US customers.

"There are currently upwards of 100,000 home-based phone representatives in the United States," IDC said. "Compared with traditional outsourcing and offshor, companies utilising home-based agents can access highly skilled representatives that are closely attuned to the US market at very reasonable cost."

The report may give some comfort to those concerned that the offshore phenomenon is undercutting US workers. Research firm Forrester has predicted that more than three million US service jobs will go offshore by 2015. But the scope and impact of offshoring is not certain.


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In the 80s most of your "Live Sex Chat " lines where from women at home.

A friend of mine did work on one companies accounting puter and the "company" in NC was in a trailer. All their "hot girls" were at home.