Refusing to climb the phone tree

[RealUnimportant]

My Doctors has a phone tree, it's got 2 options - Reception or Reception!

[wordgirl]

I've actually encountered one or two places that thought of the "0 to bypass" thing -- if you press it, it'll either start the menu listing over, or say "Invalid input"

That's my employer. Zero just puts you right back at the portal to limbo.

[WishfulSpirit]

Unless it is one of those that you have to "say" what you want. I usually just say "Bananas" till I get an operator.

Oddly enough, screaming a certain four letter word (the one that refers to gaining carnal knowledge) into the phone will often take you right to the operator. I learned this from one of the people who wrote into Miss Manners, I'd NEVER do that myself.

[Kit-Ginevra]

It would be nice on some systems to be able to press the buttons and skip the messagey bit,so if I've dealt with you before and know the department I need is button 1,then button 2,then button 4,I can hop straight there.
Worst is the Home Office phone tree. Lots of spiel read out,then a choice of buttons,then more spiel that can't be skipped.Once you get to where you want to be,there is NO HOLD OPTION.You get a 'All our operators are busy.Please call back later'.

[BPFH]

Oddly enough, screaming a certain four letter word (the one that refers to gaining carnal knowledge) into the phone will often take you right to the operator. I learned this from one of the people who wrote into Miss Manners, I'd NEVER do that myself.

I might, but I've found it's usually sufficient, after having the voice recog muck things up repeatedly, to growl, "Get me a human being."

[Kiwi]

My local bank has a local number, you call it and no matter what you press it auto forwards you to a call center. Once at the call center they route your call back to the local bank...

Me: *dials banks number, presses 4 to make an appointment at the local branch*
Bank phone: this is bank xyz in kiwitown how can I help you
Me: I need to make an appointment please
Bank phone: okay let me transfer you back to the local branch
Me: *facepalm* thank you

[MrSmiley]

When using the phone tree for one of my bills, I get "Please enter your account number followed by the # key". Doing so works great. The system even verifies it's valid before letting you progress. And then connects you to a human being whose first question is always "Can I please have your account number?"

[fireheart]

When using the phone tree for one of my bills, I get "Please enter your account number followed by the # key". Doing so works great. The system even verifies it's valid before letting you progress. And then connects you to a human being whose first question is always "Can I please have your account number?"

I think it's meant to be a security thing????

[Silent-Hunter]

My favorite phone tree ever was the one for WordPerfect corp. many years ago. They had a live "queue jockey" that would read out the length of each queue in real time... "Okay, if you are waiting on printing, there's only three of you in line, but it's a bad day for fonts and formatting, because there are eight of you waiting. Macros are looking fine with only two people wanting support on our fiendishly complex programming system, but poor sots with trouble installing our software are going to have to wait a bit with five.

I miss WordPerfect. Brings back memories of school, and MS-DOS which I also miss.

[sirwired]

I think it's meant to be a security thing????

Nah... just a phone system incapable of properly passing information to the reps terminal. I don't see what sort of attack this would stop; I mean if you've managed to type it in, you are just going to be reading them the same number.

[manybellsdown]

Second the hate for the ones that list a zillion options, none of which apply to the caller's situation, then make it nearly impossible to reach a human. Gethuman.com is very helpful.

Someone at an insurance company 3 times zones away from me goofed, and sent a bunch of account information for a person with my name to my email. I tried to call and tell them they had the wrong email address, and every option asked for my account number. Naturally that was the one piece of information the email didn't have listed. I don't have an account! How do I talk to a human!?

I finally got the voice recognition to transfer me to a person by saying nonsense syllables that it couldn't understand.

[raudf]

Makes me grateful for my bank, which has their phone tree set end with, "For all other options, stay on the line and we will transfer you to an account representative." The rest of the tree, I can usually find online in my account.. but once in a while, I have a question that none of the computerized stuff can answer. Like, "I see a fraudulent charge on my account. Since it hasn't posted yet, I need the last four digits of the card so I know which to cancel!" The tree only takes you to fraud that can cancel the card, but can't see your account, so which one to cancel?!

[notalwaysright]

Me: "Thank you for calling The Resort. May I place you on hold for a minute?"
SC: "No! I'm calling long distance and you've put me on hold three times already!"

First off, yes phone trees can be annoying, okay. But smaller places (not credit card or internet or cell phone companies) usually have fairly logically set up systems. Plus, if she'd already been put on hold before, wouldn't it make sense to just listen to the dang thing? Yes I know, where am I? I get people who are angry that they are calling long distance from another country (probably the same exact thing as the OP) and they totally try to use that to get me to put off customers in the physical store. Sorry, doesn't fly. Hang up and call back, I dare you. Now the person who had answered the original call is helping someone else and you have to start all over again.

My bank is smaller, and I can call my local branch direct. If it's something they can't deal with, like fraud, they will give me the actual number for the fraud department. No stress.

[prjkt]

I've actually encountered one or two places that thought of the "0 to bypass" thing -- if you press it, it'll either start the menu listing over, or say "Invalid input"

At least over here, most of them I've called say, "If you'd like to hear these options again, press 0"

Pretty clever way around the "flaw" in the system...

[fireheart]

At least over here, most of them I've called say, "If you'd like to hear these options again, press 0"

Pretty clever way around the "flaw" in the system...

Some I've heard say "9" but if you press "0" you won't get through to an operator any quicker.

Ye welfare office has one of the most annoying phone trees I've ever encountered and I do feel sorry for the poor sap on the other end. This is roughly how it works:

-You state your reference number if you have one.
-You repeat some numbers and answer a security question (this is their version of "security" I guess. It's meant to be voice-activated, so if you're Pavarotti trying to use fireheart's account you won't get anywhere)
-You then have to state what you're there for. THAT's where the system throws a fit, decides "I don't like you" and then gives you ALL the options for that particular number.
-Then when you DO get through to the poor sap on the other end, you at least just need to give your reference number, name and address and that's about it (said waiting time takes anywhere from 30-90 minutes)

The idea I guess is that 80-95% of their functions can be done online or by using one of their apps (I don't trust the reporting function on said app, but the app itself is damn useful for submitting documents for a claim or getting hold of letters. When I had to report in, I'd go online from my computer and do it.) so you're not so reliant on the phone system.

Thankfully with the last time I had to deal with the welfare office, most of it was face-to-face since it didn't involve actual payments-one was for an interview, the other was to update my address in their system.