Yesterday Was Not My Day

[Dips]

Yesterday, I not only had to deal with these people, I also found that a spammer is spoofing one of the email addresses I answer her at work. In the space of an hour I got three hundred bounces from servers which rejected the spam in MY in box.

After wading through and deleting those, I created a filter and was rid of them. But jeez.

Then just before I went home, two minutes before we close, I had this wonderful conversation.

Me: [Company name]. This is Dips. How may I help you?

SC: [describes a hardware interface problem that I don't handle. It's handled by "tech support," which usually means Carl and sometimes Eugene, who wasn't there]

Me: I'll have to transfer you to tech support for that. Unfortunately, they close at 4:45. I can transfer you to Carl's voice mail. You can leave a message and he will call you back tomorrow.

SC:...

[The SC tried the silence trick; the hope is that you will become uncomfortable enough to fill the silence with something they want to hear. The silence trick doesn't work on me because I'm aware of it. My usual response is to go silent myself for a while. So it went on for about 30 seconds before I said something.]

Me: Would you like his voice mail?

SC:...

[I couldn't believe they still thought that trick would work after it failed the first time.]

Me: Another option would be to call back yourself tomorrow. We open at 9:00 eastern time.

SC:...

[Now it was just funny.]

Me:...

SC:...

[Well, I DID want to go home.]

Me: Would you like me to transfer you to Carl's voice mail or would you prefer to call again tomorrow?

SC: I called you people an hour ago and was told that someone would be there.

[I have to give her credit for changing tactics. She was probably lying; we always warn people about the 4:45 tech support deadline when we give them information about calling us back later. Regardless of whether or not she actually called an hour ago, she had now reached "someone" (me) and I was "there" (at work). So that tactic was going to fail too. ]

Me: Yes. I'm here until 5:00 and I can help customers with installation, activation, sales and general customer service. Technical support, however, does not take any calls after 4:45 PM. Would you like me to transfer you to Carl's voice mail so he can call you back tomorrow?

The SC finally agreed and let me transfer her and I finally got to go home.

[El Barto]

[I have to give her credit for changing tactics. She was probably lying; we always warn people about the 4:45 tech support deadline when we give them information about calling us back later. Regardless of whether or not she actually called an hour ago, she had now reached "someone" (me) and I was "there" (at work). So that tactic was going to fail too. ]

Don't you love working for small companies? While the NYS agency that I work for has about 3500 employees (almost 2000 of them are in the central office where I work) the section I work in has 12 people. We all sit within earshot of each other. 1 is the receptionist, 1 is the section manager (she doesn't interact with the public very much), 3 people do job A, 2 people do job B, and 5 people do job C. I do job C.

Saying K or R told you that you could do something won't work, I can ask them about it without leaving my chair or I'll just transfer you to that person so they can call you on your bullshit themselves. Claiming you don't speak English very well won't work for most people, one of our employees is fluent in Spanish. Calling back hoping you'll get someone else who will give you a different answer won't work, we have 1 receptionist and she'll recognize your voice and give you to the same person you talked to last time.

Being rude won't help either, we don't have any competition, you can't go to Wal Mart to get this license cheaper, we don't have to put up with you or give in like retail workers, we'll just hang up on you... or be rude to you if you piss us off enough.

[bainsidhe]

I usually respond to dead airspace with a "hello, HELLO" and then hanging up. If you need help, act like an adult. Though in truth, I don't hang up out of evilness on my part, sometimes lines really do disconnect. More annoying is when people just randomly put you on hold while you listen to their musak. I'll listen for a litte bit, but I will eventually hang up. I have other customers calling who will actually TALK to me, after all.

[myswtghst]

Grr. I just had something similar happen, just 1 minute before I logged out of my phone to get dinner. Without fail, for the past two weeks, I always get a jerk who runs 15 minutes into my freaking dinner break ranting about nothing.

Our tech support guys leave at 7pm. It has been this way for at least a year and a half, if not longer, and yet techs never seem to remember this. If you call at 7:01, if I'm feeling nice, I'll see if they're still around. But I will inform you that at this point, it's emergency only, at their discretion, and if no one is here, I'll have to page the on call. Guy tonight had been talking to tech support for the past few hours - calling in and being patched through. When I told him that it was now after 7, hence no more tech support, he pitched a fit. He asked me why I was making it so difficult (I didn't know telling you the truth and requesting a case number that you should have was being difficult ), why I couldn't just put him through to Dave (gee, cuz we only have one of those) and started asking me to transfer him to my own department.

So yeah, I feel for you, Dips.