Washington – Sen. Chuck Schumer wants to tax companies 25 cents for every customer service call that’s outsourced overseas.
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Schumer (D-N.Y.) proposed a bill yesterday that would slap the tax on companies that transfer calls from American area codes to foreign call centers.
“How many times do we hear of a company shutting down a facility in New York or elsewhere in the country and sending the jobs abroad? Almost daily,” Schumer said.
The measure also would require telling U.S. customers that their call is being transferred – and to which country.
“1.6 billion calls are being transferred to call centers, often without the customer’s knowledge,” Schumer said.
Companies would be required to report their total customer service calls and the number relayed overseas.
India, Indonesia, Ireland, Canada, the Philippines and South Africa are countries popular with American companies looking to outsource call centers to cut costs.
I like this proposal.
This guy is absolutely useless .. Always beating up businesses . We need someone to run against him in November.
This is yet the best idea from schumer. I used to think that this oversees customer service would end , but its getting worse, you cannot understand what there talking about. Great idea for consumers , and for our economy.same thing should be with companies transferring factory’s.
Here’s a novel idea – how about taxing companies less so that they might actually be able to afford US call centers?
Why is adding fees and taxes the default solution for everything that is wrong in this country?
More regulations and more taxes. This country is getting greater by the day
This proposal benefits only the government, in the form of a possible $400 million a year cash cow. Companies will have to deal with the extra tax and the cost of keeping track of all those millions of calls and reporting them. These costs will be passed on to consumers, who will still be stuck yelling at “Eric” from Mumbai.
Of course, even with all this extra cost to companies, it will still be cheaper than US based call centers…
What is he thinking? After voting for the health reform he is shocked that people are finding offshore employees.
These politicians should be required to run a company before they run for election
Great Idea.
If the cost benefit were not there most companies would stop foreign call centers quickly. thet bring aggravation but lower costs.
Most companies are forced to do it because their competitors do so, to be different makes your costs higher.
Its just mind boggling how stupid and dumb the new york voter must be to support such a moron. Its simple math. Dissolve all the union mafia and you’ll have all the call centers back in no time. If you’ll force company’s to give 2 months leave for spitting. for sure they’ll move it overseas. He creates the problem and then comes screaming wolf and by taxing the company’s only the consumer pays. Just take a look at your cell phone bill you pay more in taxes and surcharges then for the phone plan and now their investigating the cell company’s to. And ya they have a great solution. Another tax. “VOTE HIM OUT”
schumer is a fool. every cost of business will be passed along to the consumer. why doesnt he encourage us workers to WORK instead of kvetch. for that matter why doesnt HE run a business for 2 years before he tells business owners who shvitz to build a business what to do.
be ready for more recorded support info instead of a live operator
My phone bill is $39.99 with taxes and surcharges of $21.00. How can anyone exist. Get rid of all these bum politicians
I don’t know how to stop the transfer of these call centers to other countries, but I do know that customer service with “specialists” who can not speak Engilsh properly or be heard or understood properly is no customer service at all!
Rather than taxing the corporations and risk them just passing it on to the consumer (which only further hurts the consumer)…..
The govt should give a tax CREDIT to business that bring jobs back. That’s would create jobs and the consumers will spend that money in our economy , which creates more jobs and so on.
That’s how you stimulate the economy.
WOW! Look at their clean desks. If this was here in USA their desks would be cluttered with useless paper and family pictures.
Just like monopolies are illegal, offshore call centers of any sort, i.e. customer service, tech support, etc. should be illegal. They’re both evil.
Those evil companies can easilly afford US call centers, but they are all greedy. Many US companies that are very profitable use American call centers, like Canon for example.
I would be nice to think that Companies would actually use incentives to hire American workers. The truth is they look for loop holes so that they can pocket the money and still off shore jobs. Lets face it senior business leaders have become lazy. It is easier for them to pay cheap labor then to find a way to make it work in the US. I agree there are some lazy Americans but for the most part they work more hours and have less time off then their foreign counterparts.
I would be for incentives that were clearly spelled out with no loop holes to help American companies hire and stay in the US and slap them with a tax if they choose not to