Pros
1. It's a job. It pays money which pays the bills... like my DTE bill. 2. The people there are probably the only reason I've stuck around as long as I have. 3. When it was $14 an hour with paid vacation and holidays, working afternoons was worth it.
Cons
1. NCO- If you don’t work at DTE, you probably don’t know this, but they contract out to an organization called NCO. NCO’s only purpose, as far as can be determined, is to take your calls as quickly as possible. They’ll tell you what you want to hear and get you off the line to take the next call. Not to say they’re all incompetent, but I’d say most of the time when you’re calling back, it’s because NCO either misinformed you or didn’t place the right order to do the job you need done. 2. CSB- The wonderful program DTE uses to schedule events. It likes to go down at random intervals and, whenever they do maintenance, rather than scheduling it for sometime during a midnight shift (when calls are typically at their lowest), they’ll schedule them during morning or afternoons (granted, mainly on the weekend when calls are TYPICALLY lower, but not always the case). During this time, no order information or account information can be viewed. 3. Downtime Forms- When the above program, CSB, is down, all Gas leaks and Outage calls have to be done on “downtime forms.” These forms are Microsoft Word programs that need to be typed in manually and, for the outage forms, DO NOT LIST the questions you need pertinent to servicing the customer (such as, if there’s a down wire, is it within reach, is it sparking, etc). Those questions have to be REMEMBERED by the reps doing the forms. Also, there are no safety precautions listed on the downtime forms, which are required to be stated for customer safety. 4. Being a Contractor: As per previous reviews, DTE treats their contractors poorly. When cuts came around with pay, contractors lost about $2 on average from their hourly pay (doesn’t seem like a lot, but it’s almost the equivalent of working a four day week instead of five… which of course, wasn’t an option). They also took away the paid vacations and holidays. Granted, we’re contract, it’s actually our company who did so, but that was ONLY because DTE would have fired us all last year around Christmas time had the changes not been made. After most of us had worked a year for them and gone through 3 WEEKS of training in a classroom and a week in a “pod” setting (btw, they also tested on the material taught during the classroom. If you failed ONE test, you were terminated). This year, they’re eliminating the afternoon shifts and instead only allowing dayshifts. So, afternoon shifts (which handle 90% of the emergency calls) will now be moving to days and be forced to lose their premium and have to work on billing calls. 5. Overtime- If call volume is up and Union doesn’t want to stay, guess who is? Yup. Contract. You can’t say no to it either. Oh, and if there’s a storm and it so happens you’re working the day before you’re off? Guess what, you’re probably coming in on your off day to talk to customers. You had a family event planned two months in advance? Sorry, you’re working. Deal with it. 6. Right Hand vs Left Hand- The system is broken. I might not know how to fix it, but I know something should be done. Customers wait the whole day for their services to be turned on (such as a restore) and are told it’ll be between 8a-4:30p. Don’t believe it. It can be anytime between 8a-10p and they have 24-48hrs once your payment posts. Oh, and if you’re cut at the pole? 24-72hrs (but they’ll tell you either that day or 24-48hrs, because that’s what we’re TOLD to tell you). And that’s BUISNESS HOURS. Don’t EVER get cut on a Friday or you’re out till Monday! Granted, you had 3 months to pay your bill, but that seems harsh. Other things happen too, like a meter restore being sent out when it should be at the pole (BIG DIFFERENCE!!). That’s not the reps fault either, the lovely CSB is suppose to catch that. 7. No career advancement- 2 years of being contract. Haven’t been hired in, haven’t seen anyone else move up. In fact, within the last year, they’ve been demoting contract members (analysts back to customer care representatives). The most you can do is go from being a residential customer care rep to a commercial or escalated call rep.