customer service representative

agent de centre d'appel

bilingual customer service associate

service à la clientèle

customer support representative

Overall, this place's a good starter position or job opportunity. Pay's fair, but not amazing. I'm going to rate the company based off of Indeed's criteria with explanations. 

Job Work/Life Balance: 1/5 stars 
Reason: Scheduling's a huge circus. Worst I've ever witnessed in a contact center. Your schedule can be inconsistent from day-to-day. I.e., you can be starting at 9AM on a Monday, followed by 2PM the following day. You only know your schedule ahead 2 weeks, and even at that, it changes frequently. Days off aren't usually paired together, and weekends off are very seldom. Expect to work weird days, hours and often have long stretches in-between days off of 6-8 days because of this. Paired with wild hours, this creates a pretty brutal work/life balance. Hours are from 7AM-12AM. Schedule preferences aren't taken into consideration, even though the company claims it's based off of performance. 

Salary/Benefits: 3/5 stars
Reason: Salary's fair. Currently, as of May 2019, it's roughly 16$/hour and 17$/hour for Bilingual (French and English) employees. Benefits kick-in day one, which is pretty much unheard of at a lot of third party contact centers, so this was a big plus. However, the benefits suck. And I mean, suck. Also, you need to take either their Silver or Gold packages, which will run you roughly 20$-35$/pay. That being said, for someone who may need coverage immediately, it'll provide that. Bonuses aren't paid out as promised. I'd reached pretty good sales and never was paid-out my amounts. You're required to give 1$/pay to the incentives/events committee, which will be cool if you like dollar store eggos every 2-3 months. I don't know what they honestly do with the money. Training's only 14$/hour, then you move up to 16$ or 17$ during OJT, which is stupid. Inconsistency between giving OT and cutting hours. When requesting a schedule change, either OT or Voluntary Go Home, it often doesn't get sought after and doesn't get adjust within time restrains. 2 paid PED days/year - 6 total/4 unpaid. 2 weeks paid vacation 4% of your salary. You need to book your vacation w/i a month, and it's first-come first-serve, so good luck trying to get time off as planned.

Job Security/Advancement: 2/5 stars
Reason: Job security's a bit questionable, and one of the biggest reasons as to why my tenure was short-lived with the company. Lots of turnover and attrition. During my short time there; 1 training manager, 2-3 team managers and a few other site operations team left, and several agents/reps departed as well. About 30% of my training class left before nesting/OJT and another 20% left or were let go during OJT. OJT was tricky for a few agents, and some were let go. Advancement seems pretty stagnant. As with most call centers, your typical options are to become either a designated trainer or team leader. There aren't very many other options, but that's to be expected in a contact center. Some departments were getting their hours cutback quite a bit, which was concerning. You're pretty much forced into accepting other positions in which they need, including supervisory roles, which offer NO additional compensation or benefits. I was debating reaching out the labor boards because of this. They cancelled two classes after mine, but kept hiring. It was kind of ridiculous.

Management: 2/5 stars
Reason: As someone who's worked for years in management at contact centers, I can't really say that the management's great at this site. Some leaders were awesome, but there were a few dinosaurs who weren't very approachable and had a negative demeanor. Often times, you'd hear Team Leaders or trainers bad mouthing agents, other management or the company, especially in the smoker's area. Lots of unprofessional behavior. Metrics aren't very managed, so you've got some agents taking half the amount of calls because they just sit in aftercall for 5 minutes in-between calls. Asking Team Leaders to do something for you can get annoying, as it sometimes takes SEVERAL times before you finally get helped. I had a system downtime, and it took 3 days before it finally got adjusted, so it's hit-or-miss depending on the Team Leader who's helping you.

Job Culture: 3/5 stars
Reason: Just like in most call centers, agents are very tight-knit. People were welcoming and helpful. Training was adequate. OJT was pretty good. Incentives, if followed-through, would be awesome. Not enough company-driven events or agent recognition. Most contact centers have a pizza day here and there, snacks given or gift cards to their agents. Calls are back-to-back no matter which shift you're working which can be a pain. 

Overall: 3/5 stars
Reason: Pay's fair once in production. Training's good depending on your trainer. Agents and coworkers are friendly for the most part. Job can be a pain as you're constantly back-to-back. Sales are easy to achieve. Team Leaders are usually helpful, but there are a few super unprofessional ones who shouldn't be where they are. Upper management's pretty fair. HR's friendly but pretty useless and have no real say in anything and have to stick to policy about everything. Pay increases are minimal and bonuses seem to not be paid-out properly. All-in-all, I'd recommend this as a fill-in job, beginner position, or something to get you started in call centers. Customers are easy to deal with as you're only working with cable/cell phone products. If you're between this and another starter contact center like Sutherland, pick this one. 

Reason I left: Received a higher paying job with way better hours elsewhere.

So, the average day would at H.G.S would start by finding an available computer and signing in to the systems so that we could "auto-in" and start taking calls. 
The job itself had its pros and cons. While most customers are somewhat understanding, there were always those ones that were irate, frustrated, just plain did not understand or you could just not please no matter what lengths you went to to try and help them. So while most customers are understanding, reasonable and great to talk to, I often was wondering before each call I took which kind of customer I was about to talk to. In that sense it can be a little stressful. I've heard on a few occasions other agents I worked with referring to our job as a Russian Roulette type of game. When I heard that, I thought yes, that would be a good way to describe it. That aside, there were certain things that would help me get through the day and help cope. An example of that would be the other agents that work around you; when you have wait times between calls, you can converse with those agents around you and maybe have a laugh and help keep things light. With that said though, there were often times where calls were back-to-back with no wait times; that leaves no time to shake off a bad call converse with those around you. These days for some, can really drag on and be overwhelming. 
One thing I would have to classify as a con, would be that for the most part, there wasn't enough floor support to help out agents when they needed assistance. At almost any given time, there is usually someone with their hand up or requesting assistance in Spark (our internal chat/forum) and they have to wait and wait with the customer on hold or on a mute.
One for the pro column would have to be salary/benefits. English agents start at 12.50 an hour and agents on the French queue start at 14.00. Both salaries well above minimum wage. There is also an extensive benefits package through Great West Life, which includes, vision care, medical and dental care, along with life insurance.
Another con would have to be management. They recently had to lay 25 people off, without even giving those people a reason for it. Some of which were agents of tenure, agents I know certainly did not deserve such a fate. Another thing I noticed over my time there was that when I first started, we had 9-hour days and slowly our hours were reduced; from 9 hours, to 8.5, to 8, to the 7.5-hour days they are at now. About four months back they went on a massive hiring spree and had back-to-back-to back training classes, so there was an overflow of agents when they hit the production floor. I believe this to be one of the reasons why they started cutting back hours. Another thing they do is they often schedule too many agents. During certain intervals, they will often pull some agents off the phones to y-cord with other agents or have someone conduct a huddle, where those agents will gather and talk about things like for example, what issues they are having. Then there are days where they didn't seem to schedule enough agents and in turn, we get slammed with back-to-back calls. 
Another con I would have -and this is a big one- would be metrics. Metrics are the goals or requirements that we are supposed to meet each month as an agent. For example, there would be an average handle time (average call time) each month that you have to try to stay close to. If that goal is not met on a consistent basis, you will have your supervisor (Team Leader) sit with you on occasion in an attempt to work to bring that time down. In a lot of cases, since there aren't enough Team Leaders, each T.L. will have too many people on their roster, so the amount of help or coaching you get is not enough. So after certain points, when there is not enough progress being made, your T.L. will issue a verbal or written warning (a corrective). People have been fired for this before and I'm sure will continue to be.  It just seems wrong for that to happen to an agent who consistently receives good numbers for feedback and resolution from our customers (customers are sent out surveys after calling in to rate the agent they had, issue resolution and willingness to recommend). It is like they expect agents to be mindless, heartless robots. Trust me, customers are a lot more receptive to you and are less inclined to lash out when you show understanding and are empathetic of their issue or situation. To me, it is most important to show the customer that you care, that they are not just a number, and that you have given every possible effort to help resolve the issue(s) they are calling about. Sometimes, all that is impossible to get done in 440 seconds. I think they sometimes forget it is called customer service and that our department is called client care.
All in all, the whole experience of working at H.G.S. was both good and bad. The job itself, I would definitely not recommend to anyone, but I have to say, I met some really great people while working there. I call it that a wash.

They do not have a good training system implemented at the moment. You go on the floor on the third day (closely supervised of course) and listen in to calls. Come the 5th day you are talking to your customers with someone else talking in your ear, telling you what to do at the exact same time your customer is talking. By the third week they have you taking care of the customers yourself with minimalistic knowledge of how to take care of customer accounts, just what you happen to see while you're listening in on calls. The people who are supposed to help you get easily frustrated if you don't happen to grasp an untaught concept easily, and you are penalized if you miss too much training time, no matter the reason. You could be in the hospital, they don't care. If you ask your trainer something, you are either answered vaguely or ignored completely (at least, I found).

Hours are okay, and based off of your performance. About 60% of people get the shift of their choosing, but you are also kept track of when you go on breaks and lunch, meaning if you dont take your break right away because you are doing your job in a call, your job performance will suffer for this. If you need to step away from your desk because you happen to be human and need to use the washroom, your job performance will suffer. If you need an extra moment to wrap up a call and complete your notes, your performance will suffer.

They do not allow schedule accommodations based on transportation, and the carpooling system is pretty bad. You need to know someone who is on your shift, living in your area, and willing to work with you, and you can have no more than 3 people in your carpool, so if you take transit Windsor, this job is definitely not for you due to the Sunday bus schedule. Though, you can switch shifts, but even this system is finicky.

The pay and benefits packages are great. You start at 14 an hour, and after training you're at 16 an hour. They offer commission based on what you sell but they're very secretive on their commission rates and they only pay out every 3 months. When you are in training, you recieve nothing for any sale you make since you are not working with your own account, and you're lucky if you have your sales profile up and running when you start using your own account. As far as benefits go, you have 2 packages to choose from, and obviously eye care is in the most expensive package, but it includes a whole lot more other than that. Some pretty useless stuff mind you. But at least they offer some sort of counseling services.

So, yeah. Honest opinion? Dont work here if you aren't a sociopath void of emotion who enjoys working with other sociopaths who are just as good at faking it as you are. If you show negative emotion to your trainers or team leaders, they simply tell you to control yourself. No one in this company knows what they're doing, management included, and they pump you full of a semester's worth of information and expect you to have it memorized in four weeks. So unless you're someone with a photographic memory, or you're a computer, dont work here. They butter you up during onboarding but they dont 100% own up to what they say, quite similar like the companies they represent. They also dont offer to give you a book on their work policies and expect you to read them when you "have time" when you are at work. So if you are having a problem and need to reference a policy, good luck.

Honestly speaking, I'd rather have a root canal everyday than have to work for these people.

The hiring process was simple enough pretty standard process for call center job. 
Equipment is provided. 
During the hiring interview the job is described as a customer service position with upselling, a lot of flexibility with scheduling as you pick your own shifts, within Ontario the ROP starts at $15/hr for the 30 day training once you hit the production floor you go up to $16/hr. 

Within the interview process that sounds great - the training is as hands on as it can be but is very limited as we simply don’t have access to what we need to adequately be prepared in the training environment. 
You also find out that your are not a customer service agent, you are a sales agent and are pushed to offer/complete sales on every call and will be placed on a corrective action which can lead to termination. 

If you make it through the 30 day in class training. You’ve now made it to the production floor but training isn’t done yet, you have a month on the phones with dedicated support to help the new agents maneuver the system work and call flow - most cases these agents are new and inexperienced some of them being fresh out of training themselves. 

Now many don’t make it past this point but if you do - you’re now on the production floor and left to your own devices with minimal support. 
Your learn that the flexibility in schedule was again another mislead - you do get to pick your own schedule but it is done in a shift bid format based off your monthly stats & tenure - don’t worry though you move up that list fairly quickly due to the turn over rate. 
With that being said just because your scheduled to be done at a certain time doesn’t mean you are done at that time if your on the phone with a customer, your stuck on that call. 
When reaching out to support you get different answers and different processes depending on who it is you ask. 
While some of the management team is excellent and do work with their employees in a professional manner, there are others that make you wonder how they even obtained their jobs, let alone how are they maintaining them. 

The company provides very little transparency minimal information - and will move you around departments & queues as they see fit with either none or limited training. Being trained by people that have absolutely no experience in the queues/departments they are training. Once your moved your flexibility in shift bidding is all but removed. If you stand up for yourself & question management your labeled as difficult. 

With all that being said if your familiar with call centre industry, this company is no different then any others. 

Starting wage is above minimum wage, guaranteed full time work, ability to take vacation within your first year, decent health plans, fast growth (if your not selected early for growth though don’t expect advancement) and it’s all from the comfort of your own home! 





It wasn't the customers that were the worst part of a job like you might hear with some call center jobs.  It was the workplace itself.  I loved my customers, I hated the work environment.

Computers were always breaking down or systems were crashing, the contracting company kept taking things away from us that we needed to keep their customers happy, and we were harshly penalized for being human beings with basic needs.  The allotted breaks were not enough for the length of the shifts worked, and there were many times agents had to stay 30+ minutes (some even having to stay three hours past the end of their shift or the call center closing for the night) because we were not allowed to refuse a call until we signed out of our workspace.  Signing out early was also not permitted.

Scheduling committee was incompetent and often tried to short change the staff or schedule people without taking transportation time to and from work into consideration.  It was fine for people who lived 5 minutes away from the call center,  but my daily travel was 30 minutes to and from the workplace, others had to journey an hour and a half to get to and from work.  Breaks were scheduled poorly, sometimes the first break would be scheduled three or more hours into the start of your shift, and then the following breaks after would overlap or have very little time between them.

Employees were given no sympathy in extreme inclement weather, even when the rest of the city was shut down and people were told to stay off of the roads, we were expected to make the trip to work.  There were several times where the call center was running on a backup generator, and the only things that functioned in the center were half of the production floor lights, and the computers and phones.  No working appliances because the generator didn't run them (fridges, microwaves) which meant we could not heat up lunches, and since everything else in the area was closed, it was difficult to eat lunch or supper.  The heaters also did not work, so when the power was down for several days, the call center became very cold.

The allotted amount of sick days in a year that we were given were an insult.  Six days in a year, much less than any other job I've worked ever since high school.  And the days would be used no matter what the situation - If you lived outside of the city and couldn't make it into work during the winter because you simply couldn't travel?  That ate up your sick days immediately leaving no room for the days you actually were sick or had a personal emergency.  We were treated like machines more than anything else.

My typical day at work involves showing up about 20-30 minutes early to load my programs, go through emails, and check out alerts. The recommended time to show up is 10-15 minutes early to load your system and set up your work space but I enjoy the extra time to make sure I'm up to date on information. I take inbound calls for 8.5 hours and typically have breaks every 2 to 2 1/2 hours, e.g. start at 9, break at ~11:15, half hour lunch at ~1:45, break at ~5:30, end at 6.

I've learned a lot about customer service, providing great customer care, time management, punctuality, notating accounts, reviewing bills, and discussing services with customers.

The workplace culture is great. For the most part, it's laid back. Attire is generally relaxed, e.g. hoodies and jeans. You can dress up formally or fashionably if you want to, it's just not required for agents. The break room has two TVs, a private bathroom, a female bathroom, a male bathroom, 3 computers for employee use, a charging station for phones, 3-4 fridges to store lunches, 2-4 vending machines, a water cooler, and a couple of tables with 3-6 chairs each.

Colleagues are an asset. At my location, colleagues help each other with things. If I forget how to perform X task, my desk neighbour knows and can help me. If my neighbour forgets how to do Y, I can help her, and vice versa. Always be polite and help your neighbours and colleagues; inter-work relationships and connections are a big plus. I'm friendly with everyone and definitely have made 15+ friends just from befriending my entire class that I trained with.

The hardest part of the job is dealing with upset customers, especially when they want to talk to a manager. Some customers have their mind made up that they're ready for a "fight" to get what they want and will scream, cry, argue, and berate you. It's not often that it gets that bad but there's definitely a few a week. You do get used to it. Working during holidays is the WORST. Customers want you to match deals they're offered elsewhere which usually is impossible.

The most enjoyable part of the job is a) when I'm actually able to help customers and they are genuinely grateful instead of shrugging me off, and b) seeing my colleagues. Without making the great connections I have I definitely would find work 90% less enjoyable. Colleagues provide a great support system, help you when you need it, are there to talk between calls, and genuinely help you stay upbeat after a rough call.

Why work for a call center? The people you work with and the chance to help customers who honestly need help given how little they know about their contract and the lack of response the company gives to proactively teach them.

Why not work for a call center? The pressure. Not from the customers themselves. Most fall into three groups, those who are honestly bewildered by their bill or a situation, those who want to know what went on and those who are playing the system because the company allows them to do so instead of setting up rules and abiding by them. The real pressure comes with the "we're not talking about sales but we really are" attitude. The upsell is there, built into the pitch as you work hard to solve the problem and open up the possibilities of what laying down some more money will accomplish.

I was very good at my job, interacting with my customers and generally doing a very good ratio of helping them. Selling is something I recognize has to be done but it's right there with cleaning the slime from a toliet. Not that the selling is bad but the sneaky way they try to orchestrate it into every conversation even though it is patently clear that the customer has absolutely no interest in it.

Selling tools. What a joke. The first day of the internet sales we were told the whole program that we were supposed to learn on was frozen and not to be used. Instead, the "leader" told us in a few minutes what we were to do. No slides, no examples. It wouldn't have been too bad but the leader I had either had a bad case of the runs for the first few months or he was with the girl who was always running up to him and occupying him while he conveniently forgot about other things. Still, we struggled through and about four weeks later, we got a binder with some info. A bit of a joke too but you take what you can get.

The reason I was fired. Pressure was brought onto all of us to perform. It was like doing dentistry without the proper tools. But most of us did well, considering what we were giving. But for all the sales that were being done by me, none of them were going through. After waiting for an answer from the "higher ups", I elected to break a rule and that was to go into the accounts, check on the sales that were supposed to happen ( they had and still have a broken mechanism for reports of sales and meanwhile, the agents feel the pressure. Eventually, through my efforts and that of a tl who actually did his job (not mine), the error was found. 

So, would I take another job at a call center? Probably. Would I try as hard as I did this time. No. 6 years of supreme efforts to be dismissed without as much as 10 words of explanation. Give as little as you can, appear dumb, buy as much time as you can. Treat the leaders as they treat you.

If you're thinking of applying to HGS - Beware. They advertise full time work - yet every summer cut hours by 1.5 hours a day at least. The system they use to keep track of your vacation hours and paid sick days off is also flawed - it doesn't accurately keep track. Use your paycheck. The systems they use to help customers, such as ICM, SGI, and almost every other tool, is constantly buggy or down or worse - breaks in the middle of the call. There was not one day at HGS that a tool or system worked perfectly all day. 

Customers hate you - that's it. End of story. To the customer, you are nothing. You are a roadblock to working internet. That is ALL you are. You will be yelled at, insulted, unappreciated, and complained to, all day, every day, for 8.5 hours a day (7.5 or less in the summer! Only 7 paid!) 

The pay is already bad enough, considering what the company itself makes per agent per hour. How would you feel knowing that you get just over HALF what the company makes per agent per hour. Along with hour cuts - and consistently tacking on more responsibilities per call without any HINT of a pay raise - that is what killed the job for me. After the initial training - whenever the company tacks on more products, you will be technical support for those products, and you will not receive training on it. You have to follow the call time reduction techniques to the LETTER, or you will lose points on your quality score, which, by the way, 90% of the time completely relies on the customers rating of you and not how good you actually did on the call. 

At the site I worked at there were 3 departments. Customer Service, Business Wireless Customer Service, and internet technical support.

Business Wireless and Customer Service CONSISTENTLY have 30-45+ minutes of time between calls to screw around. The most Internet Tech Support ever had was 20 minutes, and that was on new years eve, close to midnight. Did Internet Technical support ever get anything special for their increased workflow compared to the others? No. 

Be ready to not be appreciated at all, and treated like garbage by your customers. 

The only good part of the job - the part that made it bearable - was the coworkers and the management. The management knew what you needed, and would let you take a few minutes off for any personal reasons, to vent, to do whatever you needed. They were the only semblance of a good time the job had. They weren't no-nonsense management. They were people, who treated you like human beings, who treated you like friends instead of like shills. And for that, I have to thank them.

This is a typical day. Imagine 8-12 hours of calls, short breaks in between or a 30-minute lunch then back at it again until your next break or you leave. You go in when it is bright, you leave at midnight & you sleep during daytime hours to live it all over again. 

(It is supposed to be a customer service job)

You are forced to sell on calls in a high-pressure sales environment backed up by measured Monthly recurring Cost stats, as well as sales extension stats & the term rebuttal. Explanation: For those who don't know, a rebuttal is the opposite end of no means no. Just because they say no 100 times, doesn't mean you don't only need 1 yes.

Ideally, customer service is set up for accessibility & ensuring customer satisfaction. For a customer to pay their cellphone bill on the phone with you they have to pay a $10 account handling fee. Want to make a commission? That is "great". It will be an additional $35 for you to sell a device over the phone versus the customer going to a store, which we actively tell them to do instead.

(accidents at my desk) 

It is hard to remember a day I didn't *** myself, *** or have some kind of accident at my desk. At this center, you get the bare minimum of 6 sick days. On top of that as a newcomer, you got a schedule drafted in the underworld. Before leaving I got to a point in my employment where I valued my relationship & health too much to continue on. (I am 25) I was not even in this company for 90 days! 

(I now have high blood pressure & anxiety issues. Others have worse issues)

After 7 years of doing call center work on & off. I strongly encourage people with mental illness, personal problems & important family lives to look elsewhere for employment. One of the lowest moments of my time at HGS was the dismissal of a dear friend who was taking care of her father being fired for attendance. She should have been able to request schedule flexibility & instead this company the company used the book at her. 

Just a reminder, a schedule agreed to under a circumstance of undue influence is hardly ethical & can definitely be invalidated with a semi-competent employment rights lawyer. So their trainer & HR can stop flaunting that totally not legitimate form.

I want this and other companies to improve working standards now... Or leave our community! You abuse workers, exploit customers & have CRTC & regulatory bodies chasing your client down to stop unethical practices. Others do share my opinion when I say " Hinduja Global Solutions you must improve or leave!"

FOUR Big Problems: Poor Training, High Stress, extremely Delayed/Unpaid Incentives, Unfair Scheduling practices

Training. 
What you are told in training about the wonderful company is just smoke. It is a minimum wage job where people quit every day. Training does prepare you for what you face on the job,mostly because the training computers have no access to systems to practice. So expect to be extremely stressed and watch your trainig buddies quit daily. On the job training is designed to force you to learn or drown... floor support could help, but are rarely available.Awful!

High Stress
Imagine trying to serve a customer using 4 different software (that often crash) while the support staff is ignoring you or telling you to read the ridiculously complicated 2000 article help website. They leave you hanging - and essentially cause you to leave your customer hanging. Ridiculous!

Unpaid Incentives
It's pretty cheap of a company to promise all these great benefits in training, and then not deliver once your are on the floor.

A few of us worked major over time over Christmas and Holidays.. and months later - still no bonus. Now we are told if we quit (which we all want to do) we will never get the bonus.

So do not count on any bonuses on top of the minimum wage!

Unpaid commissions... referral fees
There are suppose to be commissions for sales you make and for referrals. But the delay is months and months later (they know you will quit). So basically forget adding commissions and referral bonuses - you never see them.

WORST - Unfair scheduling practices
The few of use who stuck it out to get trained in another line of business all went through a hellish experience, only to lose our scheduling preferences - which were all reset to nil. I saw grown men and women cry.

Conclusion. 
Management does not care. Stress is your problem, not theirs. Bonuses, incentives and commissions do not come and attendance is not rewarded with a good schedule since they revoke your priority as soon as you make any upgrades to your training.. 

If you read this and go work there. Well, I tried to warn you.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Customer service representative 9 salaries reported	$17.39 per hour
Agent de centre d'appel 9 salaries reported	$20.03 per hour
Bilingual customer service associate 12 salaries reported	$20.00 per hour
Service à la clientèle 3 salaries reported	$18.63 per hour
Customer support representative 3 salaries reported	$16.50 per hour

Working at HGS: company overview and reviews

HGS

HGS ratings

Popular jobs at HGS

Salary satisfaction

Job seeker tools

Employer Tools

Browse

Stay Connected