What is a Call Center?
What is a call center?A call center may refer to a physical center where an outsourcing company conducts various customer contact services that act as a front line to customers.
Call centers comprise a team of agents who are trained for the product or service being offered.
A call center may also refer to a type of BPO setup where a client gets a remote team to handle its customer service hotlines and attend to the client's customers on its behalf.
In call centers, agents often do inbound or outbound call handling. The former talks about customer service, order processing, or technical support.
The latter focuses more on telemarketing, promotions, or selling. In this setup, it is the call center agent who initiates the call to potential customers.
Call center outsourcingA call center employs agents who act as representatives on their client's behalf to deal with questions, concerns, and complaints of the customers.
Aside from that, call centers can also function as sales hotlines and telemarketing teams. Outsource Accelerator provides you with the best call center outsourcing companies in the Philippines, where you can save up to 70% on staffing costs.
Call center vs. Contact centerCall centers and contact centers have almost the same functions and processes. However, their distinction lies in various factors, such as communication channels, skillsets, and volume of handled data.
Call centers focus on offering customer service through phone calls. While many call centers now use non-voice options such as email and chat, their priority still lies in handling incoming or outgoing calls.
Contact centers, meanwhile, provide their services in a wider range of communication channels.
They create an omnichannel approach to their functions, giving clients more flexibility in how they can reach a business. This is why a contact center is also called a "modern call center."
Types of call centersBelow are some of the types of call centers today:
Inbound call centerInbound call centers focus on handling incoming calls daily. Each customer service agent is responsible for answering inquiries and concerns about a firm's products and services.
Outbound call centerOutbound call centers handle outgoing calls to leads and customers of a business.
Agents in this call center type reach out to people for lead generation, appointment confirmation, payment reminders, and other related functions.
Automated call centerIn an automated call center, agents use call center technology to handle some or all of their responsibilities.
Some of their functions include appointment setting, sending shipping updates, and automated transaction confirmation.
Virtual call centerLastly, virtual call centers handle inbound and outbound calls through the cloud. Compared to a traditional call center, virtual call centers don't need a physical space and in-house agents to accomplish their work.
What is Finance & Accounting?
Finance and Accounting: What It Is and Why It's OutsourcedFinance and accounting is the paired business function that records every transaction, reports the numbers under a recognised standard, and turns them into decisions about cash, tax, and capital. Accounting looks backwards at what happened. Finance looks forward at what to do about it. Both run on the same ledger.
Most companies treat the two as one team. A controller and a finance lead share the close, the forecast, and the audit. Owners and boards read the same outputs: a profit-and-loss statement, a balance sheet, and a cash-flow report.
The reporting language is set by a regulator. US-listed firms file under US GAAP, maintained by the FASB. Almost every other major market files under IFRS, maintained by the IASB in London. A subsidiary that reports into both will often run two ledgers in parallel.
Outsourcing the function is mainstream now. Mordor Intelligence sized the global finance-and-accounting outsourcing market at USD 54.79 billion in 2025, rising to USD 85.92 billion by 2031 at a 7.78% CAGR. India and the Philippines absorb most of the delivery work.
How it worksA finance and accounting team runs on a calendar. The month-end close drives most of it; the rest hangs off the close as inputs or outputs.
Step
What happens
Typical owner 1. Record
Invoices, receipts, payroll, and bank lines hit the ledger
Bookkeeper or AP/AR clerk 2. Reconcile
Bank, card, and intercompany balances are matched
Senior bookkeeper 3. Close
Accruals, prepayments, and depreciation are posted
Accountant 4. Report
P&L, balance sheet, and cash flow are issued
Controller 5. Analyse
Variance, forecast, and KPI commentary go to leadership
FP&A lead 6. Comply
Tax, statutory, and audit filings are lodged
Tax accountant or CFOCloud platforms like Xero, QuickBooks Online, NetSuite, and Sage Intacct sit underneath the whole flow. They let an offshore team in Manila edit the same ledger a CFO in Sydney is reading.
Two delivery shapes dominate. A captive shared-service centre is owned by the parent company, usually in a low-cost city. An outsourced provider is a third-party BPO, billed per hour, per FTE, or per transaction. Many groups run both: captive for the close, BPO for high-volume work like accounts payable.
Everest Group reported FAO spend grew up to 10% year-on-year in 2022, with banking, manufacturing, and retail the biggest buyers. The growth has held since, driven by automation tooling and a tight onshore labour market.
ExamplesA few visible cases show the shape of the work:
Genpact spun out of GE in 2005 and now runs finance and accounting back-offices for hundreds of Fortune 500 clients from India, the Philippines, and Romania.
Accenture's Operations business runs record-to-report, order-to-cash, and procure-to-pay processes for clients including Unilever, Marriott, and BP, with delivery centres across Manila, Bengaluru, and Buenos Aires.
Tata Consultancy Services has run Nielsen's global finance back-office since 2007, a multi-year deal frequently cited as one of the largest single FAO engagements.
A small Australian dental group might instead hire two Philippines-based bookkeepers via an Outsource Accelerator partner, at about USD 8 per hour fully loaded, to keep Xero clean and chase debtors.The pattern is the same at every scale. Routine work moves offshore. The CFO, the auditor sign-off, and the board pack stay onshore.
Related terms Bookkeeping: the daily transaction-recording layer that feeds the accountant. Payroll: a specialised sub-function that calculates pay, tax, and statutory deductions. Business process outsourcing: the parent category that finance and accounting outsourcing sits inside. Knowledge process outsourcing: higher-judgement work, including financial analysis and equity research. Back office: the wider set of non-customer-facing functions, of which finance is the largest line. Offshore accounting: finance and accounting work delivered from a lower-cost country. Financial services company: firms that sell finance products, distinct from the internal finance function described here. FAQ What's the difference between finance and accounting?Accounting records and reports what already happened: invoices booked, tax filed, ledger closed. Finance decides what to do next with the money — budgets, forecasts, funding, and investment. They share data but answer different questions.
Is finance and accounting outsourcing safe for confidential data?Yes, when the provider holds SOC 2 Type II or ISO 27001 certification, signs a data-processing agreement, and works inside the client's own cloud accounting system. The client keeps the master data; the provider gets named-user access.
How much does outsourcing finance and accounting cost?Pricing in the Philippines and India typically runs USD 6 to USD 15 per hour for bookkeepers and junior accountants, and USD 15 to USD 35 per hour for qualified CPAs or FP&A analysts. That's roughly 60% to 75% below comparable US, UK, or Australian rates.
Which finance tasks shouldn't be outsourced?Final sign-off, board reporting, audit committee work, and any task that requires statutory licensure in the client's home country. Most groups also keep treasury and bank-payment authorisation onshore, even when the rest of the ledger is offshore.
Does outsourcing replace the in-house finance team?Usually not. The common pattern is one onshore CFO or controller leading a hybrid team — a small onshore core for strategy, audit liaison, and stakeholder work, and a larger offshore team handling close, AP, AR, and reporting.
Ready to scope a finance and accounting team? Outsource Accelerator can shortlist vetted Philippine and Indian providers against your function map and budget — start with a free consultation.
Full-time employee definition
Full-time employee definitionA full-time employee (FTE) is used to describe someone who is exclusively employed by a company. This employee may work full-time hours for forty hours a week or more, which could be equivalent to daytime business hours.
A full-time employee (FTE) is also privileged with statutory benefits that the employer provides, including Fair Labor Standards Act considerations such as health insurance coverage.
The Philippines is one of the countries where the BPO industry flourished greatly. It has since opened many job opportunities for the people, employing about 1 million alone within the outsourcing industry.
In the outsourcing industry, a full-time employee can have varying working shifts to accommodate the clients’ timezone.
However, a part-time employment arrangement typically involves individuals who work fewer hours than full-time employees.
When you hire part-time employees, remember that they may work fewer than 40 hours per week and are often not entitled to the same benefits as full-time employees, such as overtime pay or coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
Importance of designating FTE statusDistinguishing employees between “full-time” and “part-time” is important because part-time staffers typically do not receive the following:
Paid time off for holidays or vacations
Employee benefits
Employer retirement plans
Paid sick leaveDesignating full-time and part-time status to your staff can also affect whether your workers are considered salaried or hourly and non-exempt employees. This can also determine how you pay your workers for their overtime shifts.
This is why it’s crucial to understand the difference between——and how many part-time hours a part-time employee works. It's also critical to thoroughly define what constitutes full-time employment before hiring employees at your small business.
When offering employment, it's important to consider whether to offer health insurance benefits, which can vary depending on the number of full-time equivalent employees versus part-time employees.
However, as a business owner, you have to be careful not to discriminate by making some workers in similar jobs part-time while others in the same job are full-time.
Denying benefits and offering minimum essential coverage to part-time employees who work in the same range and hours as your full-time staff can have consequences depending on your local laws.
Outsourcing full-timeOutsource Accelerator provides you access to great full-time dedicated remote staff that you can outsource from the Philippines starting from $6 per hour, where you can save up to 70% on staffing costs.
We have over 5,000 articles, 350+ podcast episodes, and a comprehensive directory with 2500 BPOs… all designed to make it easier for clients to learn about and engage with outsourcing.
What is What is business process outsourcing??
What is business process outsourcing (BPO)?Business process outsourcing (BPO) is the practice of contracting a third-party provider to run a defined business function such as customer support, payroll, accounting, or IT helpdesk. The provider takes ownership of the people, process, and technology, and bills you on a per-seat, per-transaction, or fixed-fee basis.
BPO sits at the intersection of labour arbitrage and operational focus. You hand off a non-core function to a specialist that can run it cheaper, faster, or better, and your in-house team gets to concentrate on what actually moves the business.
The category covers everything from a 4-seat phone team in Cebu answering after-hours calls for a US plumbing firm, to a 5,000-seat captive in Manila handling global claims processing for a Fortune 500 insurer. Same idea, very different scale.
If you've used Apple support, ordered from Amazon, or paid with Wells Fargo, you've talked to a BPO provider — you just didn't know it.
How it worksA BPO engagement runs in three layers: contract, transition, and steady state. You scope the function, sign a service level agreement that locks in response times, quality thresholds, and pricing, then transition the work through documented playbooks and parallel runs before the provider takes the keys.
Pricing usually falls into one of four shapes:
Model
How you pay
Best for Per FTE (seat)
Fixed monthly rate per agent
Steady-volume work like inbound support Per transaction
Set fee per call, ticket, or invoice
Variable-volume back-office tasks Outcome-based
Tied to a KPI like CSAT or collections
Mature processes with clean metrics Hybrid
Base FTE rate plus variable bonus
Long-term partnershipsLocation choice drives most of the savings. Sending work to the Philippines or India (offshoring) typically cuts loaded labour cost by 50–70% versus a US in-house team. Sending it to Mexico or Colombia (nearshoring) trims 30–50% while keeping you in roughly the same timezone. Keeping it domestic (onshoring) protects timezone and language fit but barely moves the cost needle.
The provider absorbs the recruiting, training, real estate, tech stack, and compliance burden. You absorb the vendor-management overhead and the risk that comes with handing a function to an outsider.
ExamplesThe global BPO market hit roughly USD 347.95 billion in 2025 and is projected to grow at a 10.05% CAGR through 2035, according to Precedence Research. That growth is concentrated in a handful of hubs and a handful of named buyers.
Google has used Philippine and Indian BPO partners since 2016 for content moderation, ads review, and customer support — a quiet workforce that scales with each product launch. Meta contracts Accenture and TaskUs in Manila for content moderation; the work pulled enough scrutiny in the early 2020s that Meta eventually broadened its provider base across multiple regions. Wells Fargo has operated a Manila back-office hub since 2011, handling mortgage processing, AML checks, and treasury operations for the US parent. JPMorgan Chase runs large captive and outsourced operations in India and the Philippines for KYC, trade settlement, and analytics.The Philippines remains the standout English-language hub. According to the IT and Business Process Association of the Philippines, the country's IT-BPM sector generates roughly USD 40 billion in revenue and employs about 1.9 million people, with growth targets pushing past 2.5 million by 2028.
Related terms Outsourcing: the umbrella term; BPO is the back-office and front-office slice that runs whole processes rather than one-off projects. Offshoring: moving work to a distant country (e.g. US to Philippines). A location choice, not a contracting choice. Nearshoring: moving work to a nearby country (e.g. US to Mexico) to keep timezone and culture closer. Knowledge process outsourcing: KPO handles judgment-heavy work like legal research or equity analysis, not transactional tasks. Call center: one delivery format inside BPO, focused on inbound or outbound voice. Back office: the non-customer-facing operations layer that BPO most commonly absorbs. Service level agreement: the contract clause that defines what "good" looks like in a BPO deal. FAQ What is business process outsourcing in simple terms?BPO is paying another company to run a piece of your business for you, usually a repeatable function like answering support calls, processing invoices, or managing payroll. You keep the brand and the strategy; they run the operation.
What is the difference between BPO and outsourcing?Outsourcing is the broad category — anything you contract out, including one-off projects. BPO is the subset where a provider runs an ongoing, defined business process end-to-end, typically with its own staff, systems, and SLAs.
Is BPO only about cost savings?No. Cost is the entry argument, but mature buyers cite access to specialist talent, 24/7 coverage, faster scaling, and freeing in-house leaders to focus on growth as bigger long-term wins. See the directory of vetted providers on Clutch for how the market positions itself today.
What functions do companies outsource most often?Customer support, IT helpdesk, finance and accounting, payroll, HR administration, content moderation, and data entry top the list. Higher-judgment work like legal research, equity analysis, and medical coding has shifted to KPO providers over the last decade.
Which countries dominate the BPO industry?The Philippines leads voice and customer experience, India leads IT and analytics, and Latin America (Mexico, Colombia, Costa Rica) leads nearshore work for North American buyers. Eastern Europe serves Western European clients on similar terms.
How do I choose a BPO provider?Match scale to your volume, check for relevant compliance (ISO 27001, HIPAA, PCI DSS, SOC 2), ask for two reference clients in your industry, and pilot a small scope before committing to a multi-year contract. Walk away from any provider that won't share agent attrition data.
Ready to scope a BPO partner? Outsource Accelerator lists 4,000+ vetted providers across the top global hubs — use the directory to shortlist, compare pricing, and book intro calls without paying a referral fee.
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