Is 500-600 dollars a month a good amount to pay a customer service (support/sales) rep for 9-5, 7 days a week to handle phone, live chat, and email?

Just wondering. I think it comes out to be about 3 bucks an hour right?

That's too low for 7 days/week. Plus I think you would have a hard time finding someone to work that much. Perhaps you would be better off at hiring two part time workers? instead of one full time slave driven worker ? :) Just my opinion.

I doubt you'd be able to find anyone even half competent to work those kinds of hours for that kind of wage.

Hell, you'd make a lot more money working at McDonalds.

Yea, I know... the guys worth 3,000 to 5,000 a month. I'm just going to be paying 500-600 a month.

Having him answering the phone will slow everything else down. Especially if there is a good amount of calls. Multitasking on the phone is hard, and you have to go get answers right there, because the person is waiting.

A lot of people will do this kinda work for cheap, because they probably spend their time on their computer anyway, and figure they can get something for it. The job would be worth a lot more though.

Originally posted by Get-Hosted.com
Having him answering the phone will slow everything else down. Especially if there is a good amount of calls. Multitasking on the phone is hard, and you have to go get answers right there, because the person is waiting.

A lot of people will do this kinda work for cheap, because they probably spend their time on their computer anyway, and figure they can get something for it. The job would be worth a lot more though.

Well I am one of those people (in summer at least). If the call volume is not great 2-4 calls per hour then the rate is ok as the person can do his own stuff (which might have some value to him like designing his web site) while waiting for the next call.

But if you were answering email and live chat... those wait while talkign on the phone.

Well the guy will be a dedicated rep, so whatever he can get done from 9-5, 7 days a week, he'll do. Our support volume is fairly small. I've always said the best support is the support you don't need. Anyways, our call volume is very slow too. I expect it to be for just emergencies or high priority stuff, most of the people I support now do email, I offer live chat, but rarely make it available because email works fastest for me in most cases.

Anyways, I didn't know if I could find someone for cheaper, but you guys say that low huh? Cool.

Thanks!

Actually, it's illegal to pay people less than the minimum wage in the US (which is where I assumed you live). That's around $5.50, I think.

I'm not quite sure if it would make any difference if they got to do their own work when there weren't any support tickets, but you should talk to a lawyer if you're planning on paying people less than minimum wage.

Working 8 hours a day for 3 dollars an hour is extremely low.

I don't think you'll find someone to work for that low.

It's $24 for 8 hours of work... :eek: are you kidding me?

The min. wage is $5.25, or $5.50, it's illegal to pay less than that, as qslack said.

Yeah, it is against the law to pay less than minimum wage. I'd much rather take a job flipping hamburgers then working for $3 an hour. To be quite honest, I don't think you will find anyone who is knowledgeable for less than $10/hr.

People have to make a living ...

You're right... but then again, the tech doesn't live within the US.

Haha, I think you've all answered my question that I couldn't find someone for any less. :) Thanks for the help!

Originally posted by IntraHost
You're right... but then again, the tech doesn't live within the US.

Haha, I think you've all answered my question that I couldn't find someone for any less. :) Thanks for the help!

Is this a technique to get business? To show us how cheap you are? I feel really bad for your tech and I hope he realizes what you are doing.

Even if he doesn't live in the US, perhaps he is in a country that isn't as well developed economically....I would feel morally obligated to pay him US wages -- it's only fair.

One of my clients outsources a lot of code work to a guy in Romania but pays him well, real well. The guy in Romania is happy, my client is happy and there's nothing wrong with it...

-davidu

Originally posted by DavidU
Even if he doesn't live in the US, perhaps he is in a country that isn't as well developed economically....I would feel morally obligated to pay him US wages -- it's only fair.

Thats something I was always wondering about. I dont know the answer.
DavidU, you are located in the US, what would you think if there would be a country where people are 100 or 1000 times richer than in US and a business from there would pay you 10.000$ per hour for webdesign - wouldn't you go crazy?
:confused:

I see where both sides are saying and coming from. I think a lot of people think like, "well.. I'm gonna sit infront of the computer anyways.. Why not answer a few emails and make $500 extra per month?" I think this would be very popular amoung students specially. I think even if this turns out to be $3/h, it would still help the student pay his rent, help the smaller webhosting company grow and help the company's customers. Offcourse, if you choose to hire someone under these conditions, you can not and should not expect them to sit glued infront of the comp from 9 to 5!

I think his point is, that the person would only have to be on call during those hours but since they have a low call and email volume, he would not be actually working most of those hours. So, it could be ideal for someone who works those hours on their home computer anyway and wants to get a little more money every month. Am I reading it correctly?

Originally posted by Strider
I think his point is, that the person would only have to be on call during those hours but since they have a low call and email volume, he would not be actually working most of those hours. So, it could be ideal for someone who works those hours on their home computer anyway and wants to get a little more money every month. Am I reading it correctly?

I read it differently. I thought that he was hiring someone to work full-time, intensively, because of this:
Well the guy will be a dedicated rep, so whatever he can get done from 9-5, 7 days a week, he'll do.

Oh and also, I was curious about this...
If this person isn't from the US, then how will you arrange the calls? No one will call internationally just to get tech support, so you'd need to somehow forward numbers (or something). Wouldn't that get pretty expensive, and maybe it would just be better to pay someone who lives in the US?

Well, when I fisr read this I was thinking that it was a U.S. tech, but after reading it again, realized it was either more of an under the table arrangement, college kids, foreign, etc.

There's no 'moral obligation' to pay people in 3rd world countries U.S. wages. Every U.S. company that has factories or outsources work sure doesn't pay U.S. wages and that is the reason you can barely buy any piece of clothing, or any product at all really, that is made in the U.S. (Sure there are plenty, but you know what I mean).

I don't find it wrong, cheap, or otherwise. Just the way it is.

I think if both parts are happy with the agreement, then there is nothing wrong with it. I mean, noone is forcing the employee to work for "only" $500 per month. Everyone has different needs. I know for example that rent in Sweden is about $300-$500/month. If I was unemployed and was spending all my time on Internet and a company in USA told me to answer some emails and get $500 per month, I would jump on the deal. That would pay my rent and leave me $200 (2,000SEK) to spend each month. Offcourse I would have loved to get US wage, but that does not mean that the $500 per month is a bad deal, but only that the US wage is a better deal.

I was born in UA, and if you made $200/month that would be a really good job!

Rent was about $50/month, maybe higher now, I do not know. :-)

But if you made $500 in UA, you can concider yourself rich, and you could possibly buy anything. :-)

You can buy a 4 bedroom apt. in a new building for about $20k.

One more thing.. lol.

My friend bought a villa for like $15k, which had a big lake and a forest, in which he hunts.. lol

Originally posted by Bogdan
One more thing.. lol.

My friend bought a villa for like $15k, which had a big lake and a forest, in which he hunts.. lol

That's all we need. A villa that has a lake and a forest in it, now we will never go outside anymore :D

Just wondering...Instead of paying an hourly wage...Why not pay by "call to call basis"...What I'msaing is, he gets 1 dollar(Just an example figure..) for every call he takes...

Basically like commission...If you don't expect a lot of calls, you can say, if you take x amount of calls, youget kx amount of money..

Just a thought...Can this be done?

Damn..! I might want to implement it myself..

I have a question regarding those help ticket scripts...Do they allow you to distrubute the tickets evenly, automatically???

Say I have 5 tech support members...and I get 100 support ticket requests...Can the script do...--

tickets #1, 6, 11, 16 and etc... to support guy# 1,
tickets # 2, 7, 12, 17 and etc.. to support guy # 2

...and etc...

So, all 5 have 20 tickets each...Can this be done?

Do you guys know what I am talking about?

Also, if this was possible, how much is a good figure for incident... $xx.xx/Incident.

But not every ticket is complicated, most are fairly simple, so one ticket may cost you 1 minute and another one may cost you an hour...

Walter has a point. Who's going to answer the really hard ticket for $1? Everyone will just grab all the simple ones and the hard ones will go unanswered or take a long time to answer.

Originally posted by Planet Z
Walter has a point. Who's going to answer the really hard ticket for $1? Everyone will just grab all the simple ones and the hard ones will go unanswered or take a long time to answer.

Well, that's the thing...You don't let them choose the tickets...You make the tickets be distrubuted evenly among them...In sequential order...

Ticket 1 goes to support guy A,
2 goes to B,
3 goes to C,
4 goes to D,
5 goes to E,
6 goes to A...and etc...

You tell support guys that they go through the tickets in the order they arrive in, and not in the order of difficulty. Since you have access to all the tickets, and a log...You can monitor how they are handling the tickets (once a week or, every night...)

Does this sound sane?

ok here's a problem... yes you are thinking of payign your workers below minimum wage! But you want your customers to know that theyr'e calling a reputable company. A tech person working for minimum wage might do a so so job but since your paying him so little, this guy in turn will think that he's nothing and not worth a cent. You in turn are disrespecting the guy. You are thinking in your views, what should I do to receive a profit, rather than lookin in the techs eyes. Would you want to be a te ch and get payed $3 an hour I doubt it. You have to have someone that will be knowledgeable and friendly to your clients.

I'd work for those kind of wages, but that's just me.....

Well, support times will be slowed down A LOT if you distribute them evenly. Why let some support requests go unanswered, when another guy is waiting with nothing to do. I have thought about the per ticket idea, and don't think it would work out.

Hmm...ok..

How about this one..

Instead of pre-distrubuting the tickets...You distrube 1 per each, initiallly....As soon as the ticket is complete, they receive a 2nd ticket immediately, then a 3rd...and etc...

So, the quicker they are, the more tickets they receive...and more money they make...

So, instead of 1 person having like 15 unsolved tickets, and everyone else with no tickets....you get a new ticket when you've completed your prior ticket..

Make any sense? can it work? Will it be hard to implement?

I believe the best way to do this is to setup a pool of all open tickets. Each tech support guy is paid an hourly rate. They start from the oldest ticket and work their way down to the newest ticket.

This way techs can skip the tickets they do not know how to handle. You can't expect a tech to be able to handle every situation ... some techs have more experience than others.

well, what about days where there are 0 tickets? Get paid to do nothing?

I haven't read the entire thread as closely as possible ... and it might have helped me to have done that, but my response to that is yes.

People need to live. If I start working as a tech guy for this company, how could I feed my family one night when there weren't any support tickets and I failed to make money.

You can't expect people who are fully qualified to bend over backwards for 50 cents. I mean, really. I wouldn't work for $1 a ticket. How many tickets can you get in a day? Some days you'll get less tickets ... what do you do then?

I wouldn't want to pay people $1 per ticket either. That could mean they answer each ticket sloppily so they can get to more tickets in less time (if there was an over-supply of tickets).

This system is defeating the purpose of quality technical support. We (tech people) can't be treated as dirt. I decided to learn Unix for the fact that I can have a better living than if I got a normal job at a normal company doing normal work. This isn't work that just anybody can do.

I'd rather get a job at McDonalds. If I could make $1 for every burger I flipped, I'd work there. That's a much better deal than what a tech support guy would get, if they worked under some of the circumstances mentioned in this thread.

I read the thread again.

I am with a hosting company right now, so I know my opinion on this issue does not matter, but personally, I would not want to signup with IntraHost knowing that their tech only got paid $500/mo. Would I want to give my money to someone who doesn't give their employees enough money to live? No way.

Now there are a few different situations where this would be okay. Say, for example, a new mother who has to stay home with her kids anyway. She could make the $500/mo staying home with her computer on, because she'd have to be there anyway with her kids. Why not make money doing it?

But if you are talking about someone who is raising a family and has no other job, that is a complete and utter disgrace. Especially the idea of paying "per ticket" or "per call". I mean really . . . has this field taking a turn so bad that we now earn minimum wage or less? I thought that was supposed to be for people who did not have any special knowledge in a field? Uuuggghh. :rolleyes:

Originally posted by Vincent Paglione

People need to live. If I start working as a tech guy for this company, how could I feed my family one night when there weren't any support tickets and I failed to make money.

You can't expect people who are fully qualified to bend over backwards for 50 cents. I mean, really. I wouldn't work for $1 a ticket. How many tickets can you get in a day? Some days you'll get less tickets ... what do you do then?


You need to be more creative. When I was in college I waited tables to pay my way through school. At the end of the month, when all my bills were due, I would work extra shifts to earn the money I needed.

If I were to work in an environment like this, whenever the mortgage was due there would inevitably be a rush of server crashes, password change requests, etc :D. In fact there would be approximately 1200 of them in the last week of every month :D.

Is that how it is that some companies can afford to charge so little for their hosting, by paying their tech support guy $3/hour instead of $20-30/hour (plus bennies) which is the going rate in this area for a support engineer?

LOL @ uuallan. Heh, your girlfriend wants to take a vacation, so you say "Hold on, be right back. Gotta reformat the server's hard drive so I can pay for it!" :)

Originally posted by Vincent Paglione
LOL @ uuallan. Heh, your girlfriend wants to take a vacation, so you say "Hold on, be right back. Gotta reformat the server's hard drive so I can pay for it!" :)

That's a great idea!! Of course in my case, I would need to format 2 servers, so I would also be able to send my wife to a spa for the weekend :D.

Forgetting the money side, as that's pretty much dealt with, the hours are the bit that worry me more...

You'd basically be asking one person to give up leaving the room or at maximum to may'be go out for less than a couple of hours. 9 - 5pm... That's harsh and likely to end up with a grouchy, cabin fevered tech in less than a few days...

The turnover of staff would be hellish... So, if you're going to do it, make it part time at least... Oh and give them a decent monitor if nothing else... staring at a bad one for long periods of time is hell on the old eyes.

Just my 2p worth

Oh and as far as the money thing goes... forget it... $500 a month for 9-5pm 7 days a week... student or not, I'd tell you to stuff it (hypothetically of course). I certainly wouldn't host with you either if that was your policy... Slavery isn't something I subscribe to...

The hours and environment are pretty standard in low-level tech support. I worked in an IT help center in the corporate world (thankfully not as a support analyst) and once one of the support analysts was logged in to their phone, they couldn't leave their cubicle except for a break morning and afternoon, and lunch.

It does take a particular type of person to be able to do telephone tech support, when the phones were quiet, they spent time reading, talking amongst the analysts in the same pod, IMing with the analysts in the next pod, or surfing the web.

The most successful Level 1 support analysts are happiest in that type of environment, most of them ate lunch in their cubicles by preference. There was some turnover, but it was among the contract consultants being rotated out of that position by their agencies, not due to boredom, etc.

i was always under the impression that the happier you keep your employees, the more productive they'll be...

i know that if i'm happy in my workplace (and believe me, 500 a month would NOT make me happy) i would go that extra mile to make sure each ticket was properly resolved.

there's a difference between fixing the problem, and adding that little extra touch... i think it can make or break your company... no?

i ask for $150 a month for "ad hoc" support, this means ill give recommendations and setup bits of software and solve problems "when possible" its nothing like a full time job but it works for me since i get "quiet times" during the day which lets me concentrate on questions i get from people.

for sure, that sounds like a good idea...but 500 for full time work is well... a bit crazy... :)

i dunno, i guess i'm just amazed how a company can profess to offer great customer support while treating their own employees like cattle...

(not directed at anyone in particular... hmm, and that shouldn't be read as sarcastic either... *sigh* the inability to communicate through just text...)

Originally posted by IntraHost
Is 500-600 dollars a month a good amount to pay a customer service (support/sales) rep for 9-5, 7 days a week to handle phone, live chat, and email?

Just wondering. I think it comes out to be about 3 bucks an hour right?

Well, we charge $375.00 per month for support only. Then again, we do this for a living and depend on volume.

I fully agree with "i am a". You need to keep your staff happy if you want them to produce good results.

Originally posted by Hyper Tech
Well, we charge $375.00 per month for support only. Then again, we do this for a living and depend on volume.

Right, but you aren't doing that for just ONE company. You are making $375/mo per company, correct? You don't have just one customer, so you are making way more than the $500/mo recommended.

I'm glad SOMEONE mentioned making a living other than me. Kudos to Hyper Tech. :)

Correct, on the average its $375/mo per company.
If I were doing this for one client 8-5 M-F the charges would be substantially higher. At that point you are fulltime employee and deserve the benefits of a fair market value salary and insurance.

It's okay to pay $500 a month, but you have to realize that you can't expect the person to be there 24hours or be upset when you have problems they aren't there to solve at 2 am. You will also need to pay him more as you can afford to, then you can expect more responsibilty out of the person. But you really can't demand they solve an eight hour problem, because that would work out below minimum wage.

Hey,

6 hours a day (6PM - 12 AM), Monday through Friday, for $500/2 weeks.

6 hrs x 5 days in a week x 2 weeks = 60 hours.

Anyone hiring?

Woah you work for $150 a month? thats to little even for setting up software.

Originally posted by xtstrike
i ask for $150 a month for "ad hoc" support, this means ill give recommendations and setup bits of software and solve problems "when possible" its nothing like a full time job but it works for me since i get "quiet times" during the day which lets me concentrate on questions i get from people.