Career Advice

Firstsource 1st anniversary celebrations

Award winner Joanna Lowry speaks about her role as a customer service advisor with Firstsource.


Joanna Lowry receives her award for Best Customer Service Advisor at Firstsource's Ist anniversary celebrations in Belfast

What do you actually do?

Im a Customer Service Advisor working on the Sky customer service project for Firstsource. Ive been with Firstsource since September 2006. On a day to day level I take calls from Skys customers, usually about their broadband or TV subscription, but the range of incoming calls can vary quite a lot. As one of the more experienced customer service advisors, I am now starting to get involved with training and mentoring new recruits.

What skills do you need to do your job?

You need to have an outgoing personality and a good appreciation of customer service. Communication skills are vital. A good telephone manner is essential for this job and an ability to listen as well as talk. You also need to be able to navigate your way confidently around a PC screen and be able to use a keyboard

What's your work schedule like?

My shifts vary from an early shift starting at 8AM to a shift starting at 12PM for 9hours a day. I work from Monday to Friday.

What's the best thing about it?

Being able to deal with a customers enquiry successfully and ending the call with a sense of achievement is always good. I really enjoy helping people, so its good when you get a customer who appreciates the work you have done for them. There is also a really good buzz with my colleagues on the call floor. As we are all good communicators, sometimes it can be quite lively. And we often go out for drinks after work. The atmosphere on the call floor can be quite competitive at times as there are some great prizes to be won such as MP3 players, phones and DVD players. But Ive often won so thats good.

What's not so great about it?

Dealing with the occasional unreasonable customer is not so good. There are some customers who are in the mood to shout at someone and so the poor customer service advisor often comes off worse. But thankfully that doesnt happen too often.

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