Spinvox, the UK company famed for its voice to text message technology, has been highlighted in a BBC ‘expose’ for the use of offshore contact centres in the conversion of its customer messages. According to the article ‘the BBC suggest that the majority of messages have been heard and transcribed by call centre staff in South Africa and the Philippines.’
The BBC story has sparked much commentary in the media about the privacy of customer data if it is being handled by agents rather than technology as it has always maintained. However, the company states that the BBC ‘article contains a number of allegations over its privacy standards, technology, evidence offered by a Facebook group and finances which SpinVox believes are both incorrect and inaccurate.’
It continues ‘Claims have been made to the BBC, suggesting that the majority of messages have been heard and transcribed by call centre staff in South Africa and the Philippines. These are incorrect.’
However, in a statement the company does not entirely deny the claim. It states that: ‘All speech technology requires training. This requires humans to correct and inspect some audio and text to provide the system with corrections.
Mark Kobayashi-Hillary, prominent outsourcing writer and NOA Director commented in his Talking Outsourcing blog: “Perhaps if the firm had been a bit more open about the global nature of their operations in the first place they wouldn’t have Rory ‘Katherine’ Jones from the BBC breathing down their neck?”
The NOA Communications Director, Kerry Hallard, conveyed a similar message: “These media reports demonstrate the importance of good communication in any outsourcing and offshoring deal. SpinVox could have avoided this media backlash by being open and honest about its offshoring partnerships from the outset. Cloaking outsourcing intentions or contracts in secrecy does more harm than good. Rumours can be hopelessly off the mark and can cause widespread unease about the company and in this case data security. Companies must actively and openly communicate with all target audiences as early as possible.”
