atesia/italy

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An anonymous telephone worker:
Working in a call center in the third millenium, without rights

I am 40 years old, married and I have two daughters. For five years I have worked for Atesia - Telecom-group (1) - as a call center agent. I am a "telephone consultat", a term that sounds like something marvelous. In fact, I live in complete insecurity.
The company gives me a contract for two or three months and each time it runs out nobody tells me whether it gets renewed. The computer does that. The last contract expired on the 31st of March. That meant that on the 30th I switched on the monitor and a message appeared which told me that I had a new contract for 1st of April till 30th of June. By late morning of the 31st all my collegues had turned on their computers. Some of them got no message. It's chaos.
The only reference point is the union because the bosses cannot tell you why your contract was not renewed. The turnover is very high, around 60 percent, with a pool of 3000 to 4000 workers who they can rely on. The job is never guaranteed: There are no real employees. We are a kind of mass of people and each of us has to hope to get a job before it is given to someone else. That is why we demand that the company hires a certain number permanently and gives preference to the older agents concerning the renewal of contracts.
Also the wages are never secure. There is no minimum fixed income. Some months I earn 400.000 Lire (2), in others I get four million - but that is a "wonder" that only takes place when more people call and many agents are on holiday. At the end of the year I have a maximum turnover of 18 million after tax. Yes, I say "turnover" because since the end of December the company does see us as "self-employed", with all consequences like the payment of VAT. We were forced to rent the work-place for 1500 Lire an hour. We need to pay that - without earning one Lire - even when we are ill for three or four days.
The union struggle has given us a "quality improvement" because from self-employed we turned into "continuous, co-ordinated co-workers" (3). But we always get paid on the basis of "commissions" (4), that means per call. If the campaign that was started by the Telecom-group fails then through the agents who were unlucky to be placed in this company.
A further concern we have is that we want to get up to 18.000 Lire an hour, 70 percent as fixed income, the rest as "commission".
To finish this: in the afternoons I need to work for the distribution of Ferrarelle and get another 600.000 Lire a month. So altogether I can work ten hours a day, five or six days a week, and I have hardly a million Lire at the end of the month. That is why the society, despite all my efforts, does not accept me as a worker. The banks deny any loan, even a small one.
My husband works in a supermarket and his fixed income allows us to feel relatively secure. But if we both would work in a call center, how could we build a future?

("il manifesto", 1st of May 2001))

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Remarks:
(1) Telecom Italia
(2) 1000 Lire are about 50 US-cents of 50 Euro-cents
(3) collaboratori coordinati e continuativi
(4) contratto utile


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