Pros
New building in Carlsbad, supervisors readily available, flexible schedules (full time only), overtime offered, and internal hiring! The job is really easy, go in, answer some phone calls to the best of your ability, and keep HME customers stay happy. While this is the case for most of the calls one would receive, if you get a call that stumps you there is someone usually available to help (except after 4 P.M. and on Saturdays). There are ton of resources including a translation service that is helpful even if people don't use it. The people you will work with are for the most part pretty easy going which does help when there is a simple question that needs to be asked. Nobody during my time at HME ever got upset for me asking a question, or at least showed it. There is also a pretty linear training program that has been under revamp for a while, and there are improvements with each new hire. Having supervisors especially on weekends is a huge plus to help with the call flow (so there is no reason to have experienced representatives unavailable). This helped make more experienced reps available for calls no one else can seem to take. There are also multiple chances to have one on one meets with management, where you review monthly statics dealing with ways to improve. Flexible schedules and overtime, take your pick (for the most part), you are able to start as early as 5 A.M. or as late a 10:30 A.M, you will still get a full eight hour shift. Overtime is constantly being offered, stay late, or come in early, the management is very open to have people in the queues. Internal hiring was doing pretty well it seemed. There were plenty that moved on to the Installation Department, sales, and to other areas. Some seemed a little more deserving than others, but somehow the qualifications seemed to be there. Like everyone before me, the new building is pretty awesome and huge. The area is beautiful, but with all of the construction going on in the area, be ready for a few more business moving in creating more noise and more traffic. There are also extra activities being put out by the HR team, keep it up.
Cons
Technical Support is the only department open 363 days a year, yes you will have the option to take holidays off, but that also means there will be those that miss company events. The Christmas party was a big one, dress to impress, get off at noon and then come back to finish a shift, really puts one in the mood. This also sets the expectations of HME customers pretty high, which really has a negative impact on their business. There have been too many situations where I've told a customer "I'm sorry Sales, Install, Engineering is not here on the weekends, and I do not have an ETA at this time." This is a "good" answer, because this is the only thing we can do. I wouldn't appreciate that level of service personally that something needs to change, the expectation or the level of availability. Setting a average speed of answer goal of 2:30 is great, although some more thought should have gone into it first. When a goal is being missed entirely on a consistent basis, there needs to be a change. It's not motivation at that point it's an annoyance to the entire team, and makes the department look incompetent. So seeing that people are off on weekends for the most part besides Technical Support the people that work nights and weekends find themselves wearing multiple hats. The biggest part of this is having some of the most experienced TSR's being taken out of the queue to find a HME installer. Now they are teaching more on this process but still, there is far too much reliance on a single person, especially on Saturdays. Sundays are fine, in fact if you want to learn there is a load of expertise on Sunday and the call flow is manageable. The department is highly micromanaged but there are still people that tend to use special states to an advantage. There will be TSR 2 and 3's that that were promoted quickly that regularly step up while others are running around still in an "email" status. No they are not, they have been there long enough to let the phone ring and convince the employee they don't have time to troubleshoot all while they are on Tinder. Pay has been brought up in multiple posts, so I don't need to go much further. But with the last con that I brought up, I can't justify it for the entire department. Offering overtime is wonderful, but people shouldn't ever be feel pressured to do so. People will start to feel the burn out and it's a band-aid fix, there needs to be more seats filled which understandably is rough.
