I find the UKVI Contact Centre email service (at 5.48 GBP a pop to send them an email) a bit of a rip - off at times.  More often than not their response is to look at the UKVI website. Well, if I could have found the answer on the website, I wouldn't have wasted 5.48 GBP in sending them an email. I wondered who actually works at the Contact Centre, and whether they are real UKVI staff or outsourced workers, or even a "bot". I decided to try a Freedom of Information request. The question, and the UKVI responses are attached.

 

You can also download a copy of the contract between UKVI and Sitel (the company that operates the Contact Centre) if you want. The link is in the attached FOI reply.

 

 

FOI_Response_54636_(1).pdf

I suppose my FOI request might be what Contract Monitoring is in place to effectively monitor the contracted service delivery, maybe a second FOI could ask about the monitoring of the VFS contract in Thailand.

VFS, which has its headquarters in the UAE but is owned through holding companies in Jersey, the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg, faces claims of “gross maladministration” and “aggressive” selling of optional services since taking the UK government contract in 2014.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/home-office-vfs-visas-profit-subcontracted-contract-outsourcing-premium-services-exploited-a9056446.html

From its origins as a side project at the luxury Swiss travel group Kuoni in 2001, visa processing giant VFS Global has grown to be a $2.5bn company that remains largely unknown, is owned by a private equity fund — and yet handles some of the most sensitive personal held by dozens of governments around the world.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/vfs-global-home-office-outsourcing-visa-applications-a9061476.html