A new bill would, if passed into law, levy a 25-cent charge on every service call transferred to a non-U.S.-based agent.
The proposed legislation would also require callers to be notified regarding which country their calls were being routed.
According to Senator Charles E. Schumer (D-NY), who is introducing the bill, the goal of the legislation is to retain American jobs at call centers across New York and the country and to incentivize the return of jobs that have already been shipped abroad.
The legislation, which at deadline did not have a bill number, would also require companies to disclose what county their customers’ personal information would be stored in. The fees obtained through the excise tax would be utilized to address personal security issues, according to a statement.
US companies would be required to disclose quarterly, and in their annual reports, how many customer service calls they received, and how many are sent overseas.
Companies would also be required to annually certify to the Federal Trade Commission that they are complying with this requirement. Companies failing to certify they are fully disclosing call transfers would be subject to civil penalties from the FTC.
“This bill will go a long way toward keeping American jobs right here at home,” Schumer said in a statement. “If we want to stop the exporting of American jobs than we need to make it less beneficial for companies to lay off American workers and send jobs overseas and we can do that by providing disclosure as to where calls are being routed and less financially more beneficial to send them abroad.”
