Costa Rica Call Center Blog

• Company is focused on corporate travel management
• Will train 30 people, aims to reach 150 in 12 to 15 months
• Costa Rican operation will handle business from Canada to Argentina

The company is scheduled to begin the second week of January in Heredia.

BCD Travel is a company that operates in 90 countries and has a payroll of 13,000 employees.  It has call centers in different regions of the world: six in the United States, six in Europe, one in Asia-Pacific and, most recently, in Costa Rica.

BCD Travel decided two months ago took to open its regional center in Costa Rica.

According to the company, the choice was based on traditional aspects as the country’s economic and political stability and its proximity to the U.S..

In addition to that, the company took into account the dynamics of Costa Rica in attracting investment and the availability of finding qualified personnel.

“We discussed for a while where to set up operations to serve the region.  In the process we spoke with representatives of other multinational companies to share their experiences and that helped us decide to establish a service center in the country, “said Barbara Blue, President for Latin America Division.

BCD Travel has already hired 30 people, which is training for the start of operations scheduled for January 11, 2010.

The site will cater customer inquiries in the Americas from Canada to Argentina in bilingual Spanish and English; however, the goal is to serve customers around the world.  To do this, BCD Travel plans are to reach 150 people within 12 to 15 months.

Source: La Nacion

• Exports went from $9.7 billion in 2008 to $8.4 billion this year
• Food, textiles, computer chips were most affected

Far from showing signs of recovery, the country’s exports maintained a steady decline from February to achieve in the 12 months ending in October its strongest decline: 14%.

The accumulated sales of the 12 months ended last October there was a slump in revenue of $1,362 million.

“If we end (the year) below 15%, in current circumstances, I see very positive,” said Marco Vinicio Ruiz, Minister of Foreign Commerce (Comex).

The goods most affected by lower demand are food (mainly to Central America), textiles and building products steel, PVC and rubber technical, listed Ruiz.

The microprocessors and chipsets from Intel also suffered declines, but these have been declining.

For example, the accumulated sales in May 2008 to April 2009 the multinational sold $1,639 million, which was lower by 27% than that recorded between May 2007 and April 2008 ($ 2,315 million).  However in the 12 months ended last October, the sum of exports of the company had a decrease of 9% ($189 million) over the same period to October 2008.

This situation, in view of Ruiz, helps the general decline in exports is not greater.

The US is the country that has fallen on purchases of Costa Rican goods.  About 34% of exports go to the US.

Source: La Nacion

Costa Rica joins the Maldives and Norway in struggling to achieve “carbon neutrality” despite high cost and technological hurdles by 2021.

Source: Reuters

Bob, the patient who is the subject of an eye-opening documentary about medical tourism described his knee problems as like “stepping on a steak knife. ” The makers of the film, the Medical Tourism Association, say Bob saved about $80,000 by going to Costa Rica to receive a double knee replacement.

Nearshore Americas provided “on the ground” coverage of the fast-growing medical tourism industry of Costa Rica earlier this year, which included a first-hand account of one man’s experience with vibroliposuction.

As someone who just received knee surgery because of recent collision on the basketball court, I sympathize with Bob’s predicament. He definitely made the right decision to get treatment by qualified professionals – which in this case happen to be in Costa Rica. Given the reaction of Bob’s family about seeking treatment in Costa Rica, we have a long way to go as a nation in understanding the high quality medical treatment options available offshore. (Word of warning, the video loads quite slowly and does not seem to allow for advancing.)

Video the Documentary: Bob’s Medical Treatment Story

Source: Nearshore Americas

I read this as the beginning of the end of a monopoly held by ICE.

Existing or new Verizon Freedom Essentials bundle customers who make frequent phone calls overseas can now do so at very low rates by adding the Verizon International Single Rate calling plan.

The Verizon International Single Rate calling plan allows customers in the U.S. to make low-price calls to 118 countries, including Costa Rica.

Customers with the Verizon International Single Rate plan who exceed their minutes, call “premium numbers,” such as wireless phone numbers served by a cellular carrier in another country, or call countries not included in the plan will pay additional charges at competitive rates on a per-minute-of-use basis.

Source: TMC News

According to Transparency International 2009 Survey, among 180 countries, Chile and Uruguay share the 25th position and may be considered somewhat like referring to the Latin American region, with a Index of Perception of Corruption (CPI) of 6.7 points.  Costa Rica trails third (43 with a CPI of 5.3) and Cuba fourth (61 and CPI of 4.4).  Behind them are Brazil, Colombia and Peru all in the position 75.

Mexico, meanwhile, stood at the post 89, passed by El Salvador, Guatemala and Panama, who occupy the position 84.

According to Transparency International 2009 Survey “indicate that corruption is seriously extended” in Latin America.

Venezuela is ranked 162 on 180 countries included in the study with an Index of Perception of Corruption (CPI) of 1.9%, just one place ahead of Haiti, with a CPI of 1.8 is in place 168 and is the worst in America.

Other countries with low scores are Bolivia (120th), Nicaragua (130), Honduras (130), Ecuador (146) and Paraguay (154).

These countries have “high levels of poverty and urgently require strong and transparent institutions that can facilitate economic development more than necessary,” according to Transparency International.

For its part, Argentina is ranked 106, a position which shows that “high levels of perceived corruption are not associated exclusively with poverty, a case similar to Venezuela, the organization warns.

The regional report by Transparency International also mentions the problems of press freedom in the region and its impact in the fight against corruption.

“Journalists in Latin America face an increasingly restrictive environment, and several countries have enacted or proposed laws to silence critical journalism, which threatens press freedom in general and the fundamental possibility of exposing corruption and its impact, “says the text.

The report also stressed that corruption is a major obstacle to economic recovery being recorded in almost all nations and is especially dangerous in the weaker countries, those located in regions of conflict throughout the globe.

To carry out its annual index, TI is based on surveys of experts, officials and heads of companies and administrations of each country

Source: La Nacion, Transparency International 2009 Corruption Index

WNS Holdings Limited (NYSE: WNS), a leading provider of global business process outsourcing (BPO) services, today announced the launch of its delivery center in San Jose, Costa Rica.

While the establishment of the Costa Rica center marks WNS’s entry into Latin America, it will also serve as a nearshore center for global clients with North American operations. The center is able to provide multi-lingual services in English and Spanish and will provide the complete suite of WNS services including finance and accounting (F&A), customer service and research and analytics.

“Our expansion into Costa Rica is a key step in expanding our global footprint and providing comprehensive, integrated solutions to our clients,” said Anup Gupta, Group Chief Operating Officer, WNS Global Services. “Our global delivery model enables us to improve our clients’ business by combining the right combination of geographic location with process transformation.”

Steve Reynolds, Managing Director – North America, WNS added, “As a location, Costa Rica provides a strong combination of language skills and talent, while still providing a competitive advantage for clients operating in the Americas. Language capability is a key delivery component for those who are increasingly looking to benefit from global delivery models.”

Source: CNN

The last few weeks we have seen a downward trend on the price of the US Dollar while the Central Bank stopped selling currency to protect the upper band.

Since July 08, there was an upward trend, with the dollar pegged for the most part to the upper band of the exchange rate with a daily devaluation of 0.20 colones.

Most people agree the trend may continue for the remainder of this year and may change with the growth on the economy expected next year.

Baxter, a company dedicated to the manufacture of medical devices, announced it will move to Costa Rica its financial operations now located in different Latin America countries.

This was announced by Carlos Alonso, president of the company for the region.  Alonso said Baxter began this year with the reorganization transferring the management of suppliers expenses from their operation in Puerto Rico.  By 2010, the company based in Illinois, United States, will do the same with financial operations in Argentina, Chile and Colombia, and the 2011 Mexico and Brazil.

These movements will generate more jobs, but Alonso did not offer details on the numbers.

“For Baxter, Costa Rica is very important because of the quality of its workforce, its stability and its proximity to the U.S., both geographically and culturally” he said.

He added: “In the Latin American context, Costa Rica is way ahead and that is visible to the company.  Costa Ricans should be proud and continue working in that direction”.

In Costa Rica, the company -who arrived in 1988- has 1,450 employees, of whom about 140 are devoted to financial and accounting transactions of the company, not only here in the region but also in the U.S.

Source: La Nacion