Call centres: the attitudes of the grey market

Service organisations are making increasing use of alternative service delivery channels such as the Internet and call centres. At the same time, developed countries are facing rapidly changing demographic trends with an increasing number of grey citizens who grew up in an age of face to face contact with service suppliers. This paper reports on a programme of UK based qualitative research looking at the grey market's perceptions of the call centre delivery channel. The paper discusses the difficulties faced by the grey market in using the call centres and suggests that more research on the area is urgently required if service organisations are going to address the issues raised and effectively satisfy the needs of this growing market segment.