I was single and living at a boarding house four years after graduating from college. But then these living conditions were going to have to change because I was planning on proposing to my long time girl friend of five years. We both met during college and were madly in love ever since. I figured that all I needed right now was a house because I was promoted last year and had my salary increased by a few significant digits. My savings seemed good enough and I really wanted to settle down with Selma for quite some time now and to start a family of our own. I was 27 and old enough for it anyway. But then, something would dampen my plans.

FHA program

The economic crash happened. The United States recession has really crippled the architectural industry. I was not let go but my salary has been cut down. And also, I had a few credit card payment misses and so my FICO score was affected. Now, we have already set the date and had already paid for a lot of the wedding expenses so we didn’t want to delay anymore. But the problem is, we won’t have a house to move to yet since I was really having so much trouble getting my housing loans applications accepted. They would not touch me since my FICO score was less than perfect and my income was not that high.

Thank god for the FHA. I then found out that even with my financial condition, I was good enough to qualify for FHA loan offers. I immediately applied and now we have a beautiful home. What’s great too is that the payments are low and so are the interest rates. You cannot beat that.

I dreamt that I was swimming in some tanks. The tanks looked like aquariums. It seemed like the whole place was just like a basement or indoor pool. But then there was no pool, only these large aquarium like tanks that were all separated by sections. I was just jumping form one to another it seemed. I felt like I was trying to get from one to another right away because I was afraid of something, of something catching me. Whatever I was afraid of, I never saw. Nor did I ever know what it was to begin with. I then remember dreaming about this mermaid like creature that was more animal than human. It was scaly, it was female. It had at least the face of a female, but its whole body had fins, its legs, arms and fair were all webbed fins. It was black with spots. And that was all, It never interacted with me. I just saw it in my mind and then it was gone.

But that wasn’t all the weirdest parts of the dream. I opened my eyes and rolled over. But then I felt like the world rolled over again. It was so strange. Then I realized I couldn’t move. It seemed like I was awake, but I really wasn’t. I tried screaming or moving anything. But to no avail. Good thing Michelle woke me up because I was moaning. It was a horrible nightmare. I think it must have something to do with my pending FHA loans application and my bad financial crisis.

So, as a Filipino employee, do you think you have just what it takes to join the elite team of call center agents in all these call center outsourcing location in the country that is not just known for quantity (like India) but is renown for quality. Well you may think that you have just what it takes, but first browse through this list to see if you really have it.

call center outsourcing

A call center agent has to be English proficient. But this does not mean just plain being able to speak straight English, it also entails the ability to have a neutral or an American accent. It also means that one needs to have perfect grammar and the innate knowledge of the many idioms that are usually used in speech by American clients. This may be hard at first but really, if you, like almost all Filipinos, love to watch American movies, television shows, and music, then this should not be much of a problems.

The second most important thing is that one needs to be able to handle customer management. This includes both the ability to absorb the customer’s query at once and also the ability to remain calm, collected, and sharp in trouble shooting or processing the demands and queries. That is what you need to even consider joining a call center outsourcing company.

call center Philippines

Working in this industry means work. Being proficient in English is not enough for you to climb the corporate ladder or be retained in the company. Since the Human Resource Department head always assesses and evaluates our performance, it is a must for us agents to push our efforts every time. We have to give our best every day at work and satisfy our clients. Work is not all fun and games, but to tell you frankly, all the people I have spoken with in my company are happy with the work and service we do. Maybe it’s because of the fact that we feel accountable for the growth of the company. After all, we represent the Philippines in this competitive industry so it is just right for us to represent our country well enough through our skills.

Despite the tedious work and the crazy shift we have, we do not feel that much stressed with the work that we do because our company offers a lot of activities for us to not be bogged down by stress. We have free dance lessons, voice lessons, outings every month, and lots of bonding activities to nurture our relationship and love for the job. Instead of forcing us to love our jobs, they are finding ways for us to enjoy our team because according to our HR head, the strongest factor that would drive you to do your job well and stay in a company is when you are in good working relations with the people in the company. It is working so far because we are all enjoying our work here in a call center in the Philippines. This enjoyment translates into good output we give our clients. In the end, everybody benefits.

Before you say anything negative, hear me out first.

I am not a college graduate and I had my first real job when I was 20 (with a real office, paychecks and all). It was also with a call center company based in the US. Needless to say, the job does not really pay much. The money I get out of it is just enough for me to pay the rent. I have to work extra hours to make ends meet. The work I do back there was boring and well, repetitive and the fact that I do not get much out of it is reasonable enough for me to get out of the job. And so I did.

When I quit my job, the hard times followed. I would not go into the dreadful details about how I ran out of options to earn myself a living. Let us go to the exciting part of my story.

A friend of mine met a girl in China and fell instantly in love with her that he just wanted to drop everything and live with her…in China.

“Dude, are you insane? You don’t have money. How will you manage to live there?”

“Mark, I have a plan…”

That was when he told me his plan of working as an English teacher in China. I got hooked on the idea and told myself to give it a shot. But then again, teaching is not something I have the patience or the brains for, so I looked for other options. I Googled about China and available jobs in the country for foreigners like me and BOOM! I stumbled upon a call center company looking for trainers who are native speakers of English. Who could have known that my bad experience in the US call center market would land me a job as a trainer?

So the quest to conquer China was on.

We flew, my friend married the Chinese girl, and the former nobody, slack-jawed, minimum wage earner at a call center in the US is now a big-time trainer (who is soon to be a supervisor, by the way) in a leading Asian call center earning huge money when converted in Chinese currency.

A year ago, my wife and I started going around Tampa Bay area here in San Francisco to look for home that both fits out lifestyles and our budget. It was both exciting and challenging at the same time because while we are enjoying the options we know that we need to make do with the budget that we have. All in all, the quest to find the right home for us was not an easy one, especially considering that we do not have much savings to pay for the skyrocketing down payments the agents are offering us.

What is FHA Loans?

Those were very stressful times and it does not only affect our back accounts, but also our relationship. The whole hunt for the perfect house became a source of most of our fights. Then one day, we decided to sit down and talk about our options in getting out of this dilemma and stress about finally settling with a decision regarding purchasing a home.

We studied our options. I suggested something along the lines of going back to my parents’ house in Kansas, but of course, that option was out of the equation before we even discussed the pros and cons. Then, my husband convinced me about applying for one of those FHA housing loans. He said he read about it on the papers and knew someone from work who got his mortgage by applying for this loan.

It seems like a safe option (way better than living in my parents’ house) so we both decided to go through with it. My husband asked the help of his buddy from work and was told to log on to website of a nonprofit organization based in New Jersey that offers free assistance and information regarding FHA loans.

The website looks legitimate and my husband’s friend said that the nonprofit organization has all the legal papers to back up their claim to help people like us. It is good to know that something worthwhile exists on the Internet these days aside from controversial celebrity bloggers and scams.

We signed up to get help and days later, we got a call from them saying that they are ready to process our FHA housing loans and that all we need to do is to provide the necessary documents required by the Federal Housing Authority. Good thing we got all these documents covered and prepared so it did not take us that long to turn in the requirements to our assigned mortgage lawyer.

Months after that, we finally got our loan approved! We found a perfect little home in Tampa Bay area and it is just what we wanted. It is accessible and fits our budget perfectly. I guess we are just very lucky to have such kind people who helped us get through our quest to find a home.

This call center fad has been part of the popular culture of the new millennium so it is inevitable for people working in this Asian call center to form a sub-culture of some sort. In fact, society has already stereotyped those who are working as call center agents in both positive and negative light.

Call center agents have health problems.
Working in this Asian call center does not only require proficient communication skills, but also the physical health to endure the demands of work. Unlike the usual reporting schedule implemented in other offices, most companies in the call center industry would require agents to do night shifts since most of their clients are from the opposite part of the world. The time difference would not allow their agents to work at the usual 9-5 pace. This is one of the reasons why there are many call center agents suffering from various health problems like insomnia, sedentary diseases, and such. On the other hand, this might not apply to all call center agents. There are some BPO companies that make sure that their employees are given the proper treatment to prevent stress that could eventually lead to such diseases.

call center in the Philippines

They have been rejected by other industries so they decided to work as a call center agent.
This is just one of the negative connotations about call center agents and this is not without any reason. It is said that some companies in the call center industry do not look into an applicant’s academic achievement or attainment that much. As long as you can communicate yourself well using the English language and seem trainable to adopt an American accent, you have a sure trump card to this industry. In fact, even if you have not obtained a college diploma, you can qualify as an agent in call center Philippines. Because of the minimum requirement in terms of skills and work experience, many think that agents are those people who have either been fired from their previous profession for incompetence or those who do not have stellar skills to go head-to-head with others in their competitive industry. But then, these assumption are not entirely true. There are those who are working in Philippine call centers by choice and not because they have nowhere else to go. In fact, many agents have earned their degrees and obtained brilliant University grades. They are also very hard-working and flexible as seen in the feedbacks of many offshore clients. Good qualities that this premier Asian call center workforce have contribute to the sudden rise in interest of foreign clients opting to offshore outbound and inbound call center services from the Philippines.

loan modification helps

A loan modification is different from refinancing. With refinancing, you will have to get a whole new loan with all new terms and conditions. With loan modification, one will simply change a few terms and conditions on the original loan. A loan modification is easier to get and needs less paperwork and qualifications. These changes are permanent. These changes are of course meant to lower the burden on the home owner. Lowering interest rates, lowering monthly payments, getting extensions, and even lowering the entire loan itself are all changes that can be done with a loan modification. Now, one might imagine that the loan modification is just so complex that one cannot do it alone. But in truth one can do it yourself loan modification. There are a lot of do it yourself loan modification kits out there that one can purchase.

Now of course these kits will also cost you. It is slightly more affordable though than getting a professional guide and help you through the process and the negotiation of the amount changes.

elearning tools

I think it would be nice, however, to be able to learn a little something more than what I already do know from the previous company trainings that I received while working here.  For people like me, learning a skill really is comparatively easy, so I would like to see if I can also learn a bit of smarts as well from the elearning solutions which they are having the employees take.  My worry, however, is if they have an exam or evaluation that the employees take after they get the training.  I’ve never been one for exams and tests and the like, especially the ones with a really tight time pressure that goes with them.

FHA housing loans

For those looking for FHA loans in order cut back on their financial problems here are some of the eligibility requirements:

* The potential borrower should be able to qualify for the FHA loan.

* As with usual mortgages, the FHA approved lender needs to verify whether or not the borrower meets the qualifications by looking into the borrower’s assets, other debt load, income, and credit history.

* As usual, there is an income limitation. Those who can actually afford to pay the monthlies as computed against their other monthly expenses will be qualified.

* The borrow should have a valid U.S. social security number since only United States citizens that are of legal age can obtain an FHA loan mortgage.

* Even though there are no minimum FICO score requirements in order to qualify for an FHA loan, one’s score will still be the basis for the exact interest rate that will be given.

Remember that the FHA will look for good candidates. Even though nearly everyone can get these loans, there is still a certain kind of person that the FHA prefers to give loans to and that would be a great fit for the program. The FHA is a great option for people who are getting home loans for the very first time. This is because the down payment requirement is not so high as compared to other mortgage deals. FHA loans down payments usually just require the borrower to pay 3 percent of the amount of the entire mortgage.