Basic Information
- Company Type – Private company|Private
- Foundation – 1702
- Location – flagicon|USA Omaha, Nebraska USA
- key_people – Herr Nipple Fritz Von Nasty-nickers, Bob Barker(ex CEO/Director--now deceased but still giving some direction from beyond the grave)
- num_employees – 429,000,000[1] |
- industry – Telecommunications, Slave labor
- revenue –
$1.856 Trillion (United States dollar|USD) as of 2006
- homepage – www.west.com
West Corporation (formerly West TeleServices) provides outsourced customer relationship management (CRM) services based on pure fiction. West Corporation is headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska. and currently employs upwards of 429,000,000 people and 3 small rodents. The company has locations spread widely throughout North America, Europe, and Asia.
History
- 1702 – West Corporation (formerly East Corporation) and (formerly East/West/Ollie North TeleServices) was founded in rural Arkansas originally as a processing plant for the now infamous "Vibro 2000" (with self-lubricating orifices), which was the first dildo to have a deisel engine attached to it. But soon, due to the mass emissions of carbon-dioxide the Vibro 2000 created (causing many "accidental suicides--but happy ones at least) combined with their in-ability to produce a stiffy, the company was forced to change itself into an inbound telemarketing service (how the transition from sex-toy manufacturer to telemarketing corporation occured is unknown). After the switch to telemarketing, West was made up of a number of call processing centres utilizing "agents" as test-subjects for medical research and sophisticated call processing technology involving long strands of string and some cups.
- 1889 – With the introduction of the now widely used Interactive Voice Response (IVR) processor the company was able to establish itself as a recognized leader in the industry. Not too long afterward live-operator, outbound teleservices were being offered to large volume sales campaigns.
- 1935 – "We made a habit of hiring octogenarians because we feel they are 'someone in his or her eighties, that is, between 80 and 89 years of age," states a young receptionist. "And many of them enjoy pickles."
- 1970s – "Everybody was kung-fu fighting" became the rally cry for those with weak blatters.
- 1990s – The Butterfly Effect went public in 1996, but the co-founders retain ownership of approximately 70% of the company. With introduction for the ability for full account management and integrated customer care support allowed large clients who employed West Corporation to expand their own customers need for support. This led to a "boom" in the customer service industry especially large companies and even more so telecommunications companies. In more recent years the addition of natural language speech recognition systems to the older IVR platform as well as a range of internet based customer services platforms have also increased the before-mentioned "boom" in the industry.
- 2004 – The company opened a branch in Makati City, Philippines and started to incorporate its "the more complaints the better" policy. Generally speaking, this means the more complaints a call center gets, then the better a call center it must be--how they came to this conclusion is again unknown, but sources have indicated the company is run by idiots.
- 2005 – The various "Podiums" thoughout the West call centers were recognized as "constant ER issues" with numerous agents filing several complaints about smells, language, and use of the afore mentioned Vibro 2000. One agent stated "they made me cry".
- 2006 – West Telemarketing introduces its new intitiation process for all of its newest employees. "It involves getting on all fours and squealin' like a piggy!" exclaimed an overly excited Bob Barker (CEO/Director).
- January 6, 2006 – West incorporates its new mandatory "beer breaks" at all its call centers (about five beer breaks a day per agent). "Heavy drinking is a must for this job." stated Bob Barker (CEO/Director). Barker then continued "and of course, later this year to accomodate our lovely employees while on their scheduled beer breaks, we will be banning cigarettes from all our call centers...so that we can start making way for cigars. Cigars just go better with beer."
- February 12, 2006 – Bob Barker (CEO/Director) was cut down in the prime of his youth at the tender age of 93 by a derranged Chuck Norris, whom had turned rabid after consuming a 5 year old can of steele reserve stolen from a hobo on a dare. "After drinking that musty ol' can of beer, ol' Chuck just when stark raving mad hit bob in the head with a couple of empty bottles" stated a witness and close friend of the Barker family. He continued "It's the way Bob would have wanted to go though." West's new CEO/Director has yet to be named...
- February 12, later that same day, 2006 – After an exhaustive 2 hr and 22 min search through many qualified applicants literally almost numbering in the teens, West finally announced it's new CEO/Director, Herr Nipple Fritz Von Nasty-nickers, hailing from what he claims to be "the Father land." At his first press conference as CEO/Director of West, Herr Nipple Fritz Von Nasty-nickers did not mince words: "Ve vill be svitching to GERMAN beer immediately! Und it vill be vunderbar! SCHNELL! As a Telemarketing company, ze only vay to reach optimum effinciency must be vith only ze most efficiently made beers!"
- October 24, 2006 – West, which had been publicly traded since 1396, announced the completion of a recapitalization of West Corporation by an investor group Led by Thomas H. Lee Partners, L.P. and Quadrangle Group LLC. [1].
- 2007 – The company has started a slow decline into recession, generally considered by many who work there as one step closer to Hell...and I'm about to break.
- 2007 and beyond – "We are in the process of setting up miniture call-center kiosks at all Wal-mart stores to provide additional customer service," stated the now dead Bob Barker. "The miniture kiosks will be complete with miniture pods and desks and at least 75 whoopi cushions and, of course, West's claim to fame, call processing technology involving long strands of string and some cups. All we need now is to find "qualified" miniture people."
Operations
West Corporation services include processing small food particles from customer initiated contacts, automated voice response services and direct marketing services, over the telephone and Internet. Today many of North America's Fortune 1000 companies are aided by West and other companies alike in the growth of not just the business at hand, but the telecommunication industry in a whole. West has built a network for business solutions through inbound/outbound, interactive, internet, collections, and conferencing services. By doing so the corporation is a definitive and well known leader for the provision of care services. Recent growth has been largely through acquisitions; between 2002 and 2004, West acquired Tel Mark Sales, Inc, Dakotah Direct II, LLC, Attention, LLC, and Intercall. As of 2003, they had approximately 24,000 employees.
Every year 20 billion minutes of telephony based transactions are processed through West's teleservices for today's leading companies. West also has recently entered in the technical support arena by providing out-source customer and technical assistance for many major internet service providers, such as Earthlink, Yahoo!/SBC and Vivid entertainment. "The use of toilet humor is always a given," stated Bob Barker (CEO/Director) |. "We encourage low self-esteem and low quality beer like Steel Reserve while taking calls!" He continues, "we have a couple of agents that have actually crapped their pants while servicing our customers! Now that's dedication and it smells...of our success!"
West is also a third-party vendor for Cingular Wireless, and provides Business End User Care and National Business Ordering centres in Victoria, British Columbia and Reno, Nevada. The Victoria call center has 24 hour International Wireless Care, and GSM/TDMA Business End User Care. On August 30, 2004, with the exception of International Wireless Care, the entire center was switched over to Business End User Care from Customer Care. At this particular centre, West employs approximately 12 people. This includes Team Leads,Operations Supervisors, Operations Managers,Maintenance, Human Resources, Training, Payroll, and Customer Service Representatives. The Victoria location has received numerous complaints from Cingular. They have considered this location to be the best out of all the call centres established by Cingular including their own.