Manila (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - The business process outsourcing industry, more popularly known as the call centre industry, has been in the Philippine news lately. Recently senator Miriam Santiago said the business forecast was that India would soon lose its lead in the industry to the Philippines because of the steady growth of the local BPO sector.
The Philippines has the second largest BPO industry in the world, next to India. Santiago said the industry was forecast to post US$5.7 billion in revenues this year, whereas India was predicted to earn only $5.58 billion. Right now, about 400,000 - some sources say it's closer to 500,000 - are employed in the Philippines' newest sunshine industry, and almost every month the number is increasing, with new centers being opened or are in the process of being set up.
The BPO industry is helping relieve the country's unemployment problem, and is providing good job opportunities to college graduates at a time when only 3 out of 10 new college graduates land jobs. The Business Processing Association of the Philippines said the industry's revenues, which now account for 5 per cent of the country's gross domestic product, is growing at double-digit rates annually.
The BPO industry, which operates 24/7, has promoted the proliferation of other service industries and stores, such as restaurants, convenience stores, fast-food eateries and bars which serve the needs of its employees. It is providing employment for hundreds of thousands of mostly young Filipinos, with less of the social problems that are the scourge of overseas Filipino work.
But the BPO workers are not without their problems, some of which are unique to the industry. One of them is the odd hours, making the call centre agents work at night and sleep in the day, which in turn can make them suffer insomnia and other sleep disorders. Other problems are irate clients, tedious workloads, fatigue, eye strain, body pains, voice difficulties and discrimination, particularly from American clients who prefer to speak to fellow Americans in call centres.
Night workers in call centres also soon develop dangerous and unhealthy habits, such as drinking and smoking a lot and using drugs to keep themselves awake, and engaging in unprotected sex after work. Many of them suffer early burnout and drop out of the industry to look for less physically and psychologically taxing jobs.
But for their pains, BPO employees generally receive good pay, with the starting salary ranging from 15,000 pesos (US$342) to about 17,000 pesos ($388) a month, higher than the prevailing minimum wage of about 10,000 pesos ($228).
Filipino call centre agents generally enjoy an advantage over Indians in the industry because they "speak idiomatic American English better than Indians and their accent is more neutral," said Chris Repholz, senior vice president of Zenta company. Santiago said Filipino agents have better affinity with the American culture, and the industry enjoys higher tax incentives.
If the Aquino administration wants to help relieve the unemployment problem and earn more revenues for its people and government, it should give the local BPO industry better incentives and greater moral encouragement. And it should extend more incentives and greater protection to call center agents.
Santiago has already identified some of the industry's problems such as contractualisation and union-busting. She also said her office has received complaints about rampant labour law violations, compulsory overtime work, long working hours, understaffing, "overloading," and interference or coercion. It would be well if Congress will study how the country's labor laws can be amended to give incentives to this sunrise industry and at the same time protect the rights of call center agents.
Jon Messenger, senior researcher of ILO's Conditions of Work and Employment Programme, said that the BPO industry has often been heralded as "the wave of future knowledge work in a service and information economy and alternatively, demonised as a 'a brave new world' of electronic sweatshops." Whether the local BPO industry will become one or the other will depend a lot on what the Aquino administration and Congress will do to give it the push and protection that it needs.
