Aviva - Customer service call centre

boomshakalaka

Hi everyone,

I applied for a job with Aviva, as stated above, for customer service in their call centre.
They rang me this morning and conducted a phone interview with me (asking about my experience with call centres (none existent), customer service (5 years through hospitality sector) etc etc.
At the end of the interview she asked me if I could come in for a face to face interview next week.

Now I am just wondering:
1) what is it like to work in this position?
She told me I would be dealing with inbound calls, people wanting to add someone to their Car insurance, adding some property to their home insurance etc etc.
Is it really so bad to work in a call centre and more specifically in this position?

2) How would I best go about preparing for the interview, besides preparing for the usual (know your CV, standard interview questions,...)
Should I study all their products? General interview advice also welcome as I am not the best at them.

Thanks!

P_1

Hi OP,

Some of the things you should look into are

1 - What is a policy adjustment for home and motor insurance (that could be somebody changing car, passing their driving test etc)

2 - How to handle a customer who fcucked up somewhere and are trying to pass on the blame (that could be somebody not paying their bills and giving out because their policy was cancelled)

3 - How to cross-sell (that could be offering somebody a quote for their home insurance when they call up to make a change on their car insurance)

4 - Being able to handle calls quickly (call centers are all about handling as many calls as possible in a work day)

5 - Standard customer service stuff.

boomshakalaka

I have done an online customer service course. It might be a very minor thing to do, but it did teach me a little about telephone manners and general do's and don'ts for customer service.
For future reference, anyone could find it helpful: I did this course on Alison.com and it is free (you do have to pay to get your certificate printed but you're under no obligation to do so)

I will definitely look into the other points you presented, thanks a lot!

P_1

It's all fairly easy stuff to learn but with interviews these days it's all about making yourself stand out from the competition.

I worked the same gig before, albeit with a different company and truth be told I didn't like it at all but a job's a job and it isn't the worst that's out there.

boomshakalaka

Ah yes, ideally I would be doing something else, but as you said beggars can't be choosers! That said, I would gain a lot of experience in dealing with (difficult) customers, a trait that I feel will speak to all my future employers.

Can you tell me a bit about your experiences and why you didn't like it?

boomshakalaka

I did notice in the job ad that applications don't close til the 27th so I feel like I might have a good shot since they've already asked me to come in.

Maybe that's just me being dreamy though.

P_1

TBH it was just mind numbingly boring work, same thing every day with little or no break from it.

I also didn't like the call center environment. However it is useful to get from working in retail/hospitality to working in an office which was the main reason why I took the job.