Understanding British Accents

Hi -- I am really having trouble with this (understanding British accents) -- on the job.  Have held a couple of temp jobs in the last 3 weeks & 'attempting' to do audio typing but finding it pretty difficult b/c I can't understand what the guy is saying.  Some issues with reception duties as well -- though most of the folks who call will speak more clearly/slowly to help me & are nice enough about it.  Anyone else having/had trouble with this?  How do you deal with it?  It's really bugging me 'cause I feel I'm not doing a good job but it's because I can't understand what's being said (along with not being able to read his handwriting & other things).

Hi Carolyn!  I can't REALLY relate because I don't live in England BUT I definitely seem to have trouble understanding accents when I'm over there (with the exception of my boyfriend's) . . .

For me it's a combination of the accent, the talking a mile a minute, the English expressions I've never head of . . .

It totally stresses me out . . . I always feel like I'm easily missing half of the conversation going on around me . . .

Hang in there!

It'll get better.  When I first started my previous job, I got messages wrong all the time!  I mean completely wrong.  The Geordie accent just wasn't natural to me and I think I was honestly trying way too hard to understand people, which resulted in my hearing things they hadn't even said!     Now, though, I'm a natural and am sooo thankful for that first job -- working here taught me how to live here...how people do things.  Just keep at it and you'll have it in no time!

I went through this as well.  I could barely understand anything anyone was saying when I started working here. Unfortunately it just takes time to get used to it.  I am a nurse and a miscommunication at my job could seriously injure or god forbid kill someone.  I was very cautious my first few months on the job and was asking people to repeat themselves several times.   Many of the meds, labs here have different names and values and I wasn't given an adaptation course so things were rough in general.  Most of my colleagues probably just thought I was incredibly thick or something.

Anyway 6 months into the job I could understand everyone perfectly, as easily as my friends and family back in the states, and I get to be in charge of the ward on my shifts quite often.

Don't worry it gets much easier Carolyn!!!!

it will improve with time.  my husband has a very broad Scots accent that was difficult to comprehend sometimes, but now i can pick out any regional Scottish accent with ease.  some southern english accents make me pause, but those are fine as well. 

It takes time but you'll soon realise that you don't even hear the accents anymore. I've gotten so bad about it that I have to listen very carefully to see if it's an American or British accent. I can't hear either anymore.

And work will get better. We had actually discussed this at my appraisal last week. My boss said she's gotten so used to my accent she doesn't hear it but my office manager, who I rarely see, says she still has to concentrate when I speak because the accent is still very loud to her.

Heck, I still can't understand what Richard is saying half the time!  For me it's a delayed reaction to understanding.  I hear people don't know what the heck they said then think about it and say oh, right that's what they were talking about.  And yes it does get easier with time!!!

I've got poor hearing, so I'm not really sure if my problems in this area are because I can't hear properly or because I'm struggling with accents. I think it's the former now but may have been a combination of both when I first got here. I'm thinking of starting temping and I'm DREADING audio typing - I've had friends tell me that it's really challenging because of accents. Yikes.

I remember feeling so out of the loop around Steve's friends b/c I just couldnt' understand or relate to them. I'm sure I"ll have more of that at Uni. In the end, I'll have to work really hard at it b/c it will mean my degree!

Maybe a diff kind of job? Or keep asking til you get it - then it will become easier as everyone has said w/ time and practice.

Good luck

Yes -- it was a little easier today -- LOL!!!  Thursday had been an entire day of 'blonde moments' such that I was dreading going back for another day.  And today was the last day of this particular temp job & I was so happy that I just didn't care anymore.  (Is that terrible of me? )  So I was so much more relaxed & I understood much more -- so funny!  Plus the owner & I decided to call it an early day.

I have had and still sometimes have that problem.  I however have no qualms about asking people to repeat things or having them spell their names or repeat phones numbers.  I figure so long as I have those two things right!

The only thing at work that drives me batty is the intercom outside.  We have to buzz in all guests and young people and sometimes they are so muffled I can't tell who they are.  Usually if they are not screaming I buzz them in.  They can only get into the entryway anyways.

I do still make the occasion mistake with spelling or names, but then again the locals do too so I don't feel so bad.

I think I may have posted this before but when I lived in London I was the receptionist for the GMC.  THE receptionist.

Yeah.  I had no business being there.  I couldn't understand a damn thing anyone said.  This, through a series of tragic events, let me to sorely piss off a member of the Queen's Privy Counsel, an MP and an OBE.

My advice: no  matter what happens, ask them to spell it. 

Also, same job.  We would get deliveries from a company called Sentinel.  When they came in, I had to call the mail room and tell them.  It was of the utmost importance that the deliveries be handled quickly.  So, I dutifully called the mail room and said in my southern accent "the delivery from SEN--NAHL is here."  The guy said okay.  A couple of hours went by.  I called again  "SEN--NAHL is here"  the guy on the other end freaked out.  "CEN-T-INAL, oh sh*t!"

I thought they would have been able to guess.  From then on I was always careful to pronounce the Ts.

it will improve with time.  my husband has a very broad Scots accent that was difficult to comprehend sometimes, but now i can pick out any regional Scottish accent with ease.  some southern english accents make me pause, but those are fine as well. 

Hee hee, we were in Scotland, and stopped at a services to get a bite to eat, we ordered burgers, and after the woman asked if we wanted lettuce on them, she said "I'll bring it to you when it's ready". My husband looked at her and said, "shredded". He thought she was asking how we wanted the lettuce!!!

If it's any consolation,  I have trouble understanding some British accents too.  Many Scottish accents are very hard to follow, and Glasgow is practically a foreign language.    I also find some northern English accents almost impossible to understand, or I can just catch an odd word here and there and have to guess at the rest. 

Even here in Norfolk where most people are easily understood, I still have trouble with some of the real old timers who have lived in the county all their 75 or 80 years.     

  I also find some northern English accents almost impossible to understand, or I can just catch an odd word here and there and have to guess at the rest. 

Yes well the two jobs I've had so far were working for Yorkshire men!  Which normally I would find the accent amusing and/or charming, etc...but not when I'm trying to transcribe what someone has said on a tape.  Then this last guy -- he would write some things out for me but a good bit of his handwriting was illegible too.  Blah.  To be honest -- maybe it's because I never worked in the same kind of businesses in the States -- but I think all of this transcribing is a pretty old school way of doing business anyhow -- the first guy even had me type HIS emails!  Geez - how inefficient is that?!?!!  I mean it's work for me & I'm happy for it, but the places I worked in the States -- people always typed their own e-mails and many typed/wrote their own correspondence (right on the PC) -- but might do like a draft & then give it to someone like me to fact check, clean up the spelling/grammar & make it look pretty, etc.  I'm trying to go with the flow over here & do it 'their way', but the few places I have worked so far -- I cannot help quietly observing how generally inefficient it all is.   (Sorry I know that bit is a little off the topic that I begun here. )

  Even here in Norfolk where most people are easily understood, I still have trouble with some of the real old timers who have lived in the county all their 75 or 80 years.  

It's such a hoooge, boooootiful place, Norfolk -- innit?
 

Oh -- also -- asking people to repeat & spell things...repeating doesn't help if they keep repeating & I keep not understanding what is being said.   Also, in asking to someone to spell, then I find they rattle off the spelling so quickly -- I'm lucky if I can catch it!  Sigh.  I talk slowly & guess I'm just more used to a slower rate of speech -- like in the southern US.