You might think you've never, ever had a rancher in pajamas take your Big Mac order at a McDonald's drive-through. But is there a chance that very thing could have happened?

It happens.

People across the country today will drive up to McDonald's restaurants and hear,"May I take your order," and they will probably assume the order-taker is just a few feet away in that burger building.

Try hundreds of miles.

There are indeed rural North Dakota residents taking orders at home using a computers and software provided by their employer.

SEI-CCS, a 36-year-old computer services company of about 600 employees, which has headquarters in Fargo, Chicago, Hungary and the United Kingdom, launched a sister company, SEI LLC last year.

And it's the sister company that's now conducting a pilot project with McDonald's restaurants, providing remote order services using a lot of rural North Dakotans.

SEILLC now has offices in Grand Forks, Steele, Rugby and next year an office will open in Wishek. The company also has an office in Clovis, N.M., where they have employees that are bilingual speakers, with Spanish and English skills.

The offices are support centers for the many at-home employees. The Steele office is the support center for not only Steele employees but those who live in the area in such towns as Tuttle, Tappen and Rugby.

The company has more than 200 employees and has been advertising for more.

"We are continuing to grow, said Peg Pound of Fargo, SEILLC's launch manager for the company's Work@;Home Project.

The way it works is that a new employee is trained for one week at one of the offices, is then given a free computer, software and free Internet access and begins working out of the home.

Pound said that what happens from there is this: "Let's say you're driving to a drive-through window, in Florida … As soon as you drive up … it triggers a phone switch."

"It happens in nanoseconds,"she said.

The SEIemployee, wearing a headset, hears a beep, which indicates there's another order to take, and says something like, "How may I help you?"

Helping the SEIemployee is that that particular restaurant's menu is now appearing on the SEI employee's computer screen. Using a mouse, the employee clicks in the customer's order, which is automatically transmitted to the restaurant.

Pound said she couldn't divulge how many restaurants are involved in the pilot project but said "We take drive-through orders across the country."

Lisa Lestwich, SEI corporate communications manager, said that while there are other companies working with other fast-food restaurants using similar technology, she's not aware of any other companies doing this in North Dakota, or any companies focusing on providing the rural jobs like SEIis.

"We're particularly excited about at-home (jobs) … bringing rural jobs, leveraging technology to people in rural areas,"Lestwich said.

Pound said it's a good thing for SEI, too, to provide jobs in rural areas where there aren't many jobs. Retention is higher.

"It helps your retention. They (the residents) haven't had an opportunity for other jobs,"she said.

That means the company gets people who'll probably stay with them.

Lestwich, based in Illinois, said SEIlikes getting its employees from North Dakota for this project because friendly North Dakota residents have a reputation for having excellent customer services skills and a "we-want-to-help can-do attitude."

Dennis Sotebeer, a Bismarck McDonald's owner, said he thinks the technology will come to the Bismarck restaurants next year.

"I know some operators that have it,"he said. "They absolutely love it."

He said that with this technology the McDonald's employee who had two jobs, trying to take orders and make payments, too, now can just focus on the money handling.

Debra Buller, 50, and her husband, raise horses on their ranch 13 miles southeast of Wing. Buller once had a daily 45-minute commute into Bismarck when she worked for a day-care center. But she wanted to work from home so she could avoid winter driving, help get the children off to school and be there with her elderly father who lives with them.

So now she's with SEI and has been working from her home for three weeks and loves it.

"I see the kids off in the morning, get them ready for school, still have time to prepare for work, throw things in the wash,"she said.

Then she heads for her office space and starts her day's work.

Buller said her typical shift is six hours long and she can get as many as 250 to 300 calls during that time. Each order takes about 25 seconds, she said.

She said working with customers can be challenging sometimes, but she hasn't had any major problems.

"I totally enjoy it," she said.