So hire some more agents and trim your frigging profit margin down for the benefit of your customers. And please hire some that have phone skills and command of the english language.
And I don’t want to go through 90 menu items only to find myself listening to your musak for thirty minutes.
You know who you are,
Gateway
Dell
Most ISP’s
Dish network
and so on…
Thanks I knew I could count on you.
Oy Vay!
Ever have occasion to call a government agency. They are into phone hell big time. I called the Social Security admininstration last month and after 4 or 5 different menu’s I actually got to a point where I could leave a message. :rolleyes:
I think they have one person working there, and they only service the phone answering system.
Way I finally got ahold of them was to drive to the local office and wait in line.
[ot]
FTR my isp is a little mom and pop with a help line (their cell fone) that usually answers immediately. $15.00 a month. Stay away from the big boys.
[/ot]
And I personally love when you sit there waiting for a long time, then when someone finally comes on the phone (after having been transfered to supposed tech support), they have to keep putting you on hold to go ask a TECH how to answer your question. Yes, I know how to turn my digital camera on. No, I don’t know how to change the dpi. I didn’t wait this long to sit here and have you have no clue either, and then just put me on hold instead of transfering me to a real tech. I think I’ll go post a thread here to get my question answered, since I still don’t know how to do it.
Here’s another good one: “We are experiencing an unusually high call volume at this time”. If it’s like that EVERY time I call, would that really count as “unusual”? They must be using that alternate meaning of “unusual” that means “all the time”.
I hate the ones where you have to type in your account number, date of birth, address and life history - using the keypad - before being put on hold for half an hour… when you finally get to speak to a human, what do they say? : ‘Can i have your account number, etc, etc…’
WHY DID I HAVE TO TYPE IT IN, IF YOU’RE GOING TO ASK ME FOR IT ANYWAY?!
That’s one of the reasons I love doing business with Southwest. No phone trees.
Me: Dialing phone.
SW: Ring, ring. “Hello, may I help you?”
It’s wonderful.
How about hearing "please feel free to use our online support at www.@@@ … " after making the keypad entry for “connectivity issues”. The worst by far are the ones that charge you like 1.99 per minute or some such and have the entire thing automated! No humans, ever - and your odds of finding what you called for … zero to zilch.
Or… “Nope, that’s all Microsofts problem” calls microsoft “Sorry, you have an OEM version of windows, it’ll cost you $35 bucks to talk to us” “Nope, I can already tell you it has nothing to do with Microsoft, thanks for the $35 bye” “nope, it’s definately Microsoft, or… hmm… I bet it’s your hardware” hardware manufacturers usually 100% automated … umm… ok whatever Microsoft again “Can’t be us, where’d you buy your computer? OH, it’s all DELL’S problem” DELL: “Who’s your ISP?” “Quest through MSN DELLNET - I have the CD right here” “What did you say? Quest through MSN-DELLNET? Umm… I have to head out for lunch. bye.”
-Justhink
Welby intends on responding to this thread, but he is currently experienceing an unusually high number of posts. Please be patient, your thread is important to him.
[cheesy music]
Easy answer. The system we use is supposed to match up the number you’re calling from to your account. If it fails or there is a mismatch (you’re calling from a cell phone/number not listed on the account), the rep may need to ask you for the account number.
Trust me, we don’t ask for information we don’t need. Call center reps get hounded by management to go faster all the time, especially when calls are waiting.
[/cheesy music]
Thank you for waiting! Your thread is important to welby. While you wait, please check out his threads at boards.straightdope.com.
[cheesy music]
I think for most companies this should be amended to:
“Our agent is busy assisting our other customer.”
[/cheesy music]
Thanks for waiting! I’m ready to respond to your thread.
Anyone ever sat on hold where they actually had a DJ that told you how long the waits for different departments were? That always kills me.
“The technical support department has 30 customers and a wait of approximately 50 minutes. Ordering has 7 customers on hold and a wait of less than 10 minutes. While you’re waiting here’s a tune from the great Barry Manilow.”
So the phone rings and I pick it up and hear “We have an important call for you, but all our agents are busy assisting other customers…” They call you and expect you to sit on hold? That’s even worse.
But don’t forget “Your call is important to us!” If it were so damn important, you’d make sure there was ample staff to answer it promptly!
I’m not sure which government agency is worse - the IRS (who you can’t reach during tax time at all, and can’t reach after tax time either) or the INS - who is doing their best to solve the conservatives “immigration problem” by making it impossible for people to legally get into the country by never answering their phones - passive aggressive government policy at its best!
Annie-Xmas - Yesterday I got a call. Picked up the phone and it was a recording. I hung up and asked my husband “how dumb do they think I am.” He pointed out, its an excellent screening mechinism, anyone dumb enough to let a recording sell you something is going to buy it without question once a person gets on line to take the credit card info. Probably have the credit card sitting by the phone, knowing that everyone who calls wants the number.
[slight hijack] Dangerosa don’t even get me started on the INS. My wife is Russian, and we’ve been going through all of the paper work to get her citizenship.
The first stack of crap they wanted was more than 2 inches thick. When we took it to the INS office the official there went through it and asked if we had a deed for our house.
“Deed for the house?” says I. “No, there’s a deed for the land. Houses don’t have deeds.”
After much haggling over whether houses have deeds or land does, the official ended the argument with “I don’t know what you need, but you don’t have it.”
Dumbass.
[/slight hijack]
I’m with Lucretia on this one. It’s so bad that when you deal with a company that avoids it, you’re incredible happy. I called EBGames to return an order, and they picked up on two rings. I was amazed and honestly more likely to order from them.