Failure to ID, problem exists between phone and customer !!!

[HuNt3R]

Yet another upset irate cranky customer I had the utmost pleasure of dealing with this afternoon.

Long story short: Customer has account closed by accident wanting to get it reactivated - call gets transferred from the support area to me, the agent that's on the phone has said he's actually ID'd the customer.

So I go through my regular procedure try and ID the customer the way we normally do ... but wait a minute .. the details I try aren't the same that she's given me .. so therefore I can't ID ... so how on earth did that other rep ID this customer ... lord only knows!!!

Cut to the call .. she's wanting me to ID her a different way, I can't because when something like this happens, the only alternate option is to head to the store, ID via one of our staff members and have them call in from store, the customer flatly refuses to do this as she thinks it some sort of joke, and the fact she's at work ..

I repeat myself to state that I can't help out, that she needs to go to the store to ID, which then they can call in and we can ID etc .. flat refusal # 2..

She asks me to ID her another way yet again, I state that I cannot because I have certain ways to ID and that if I can't ... well you know the drill by now.

By now the customer's starting to get sick and tired of me repeating the same thing over and over again so she asks to speak to my supervisor .. go grab one and they refuse to take the call too - well we need to find out who we're talking to and why ... and if we can't ID ... well you know ...

Then she starts getting personal, stating what I'm doing to her etc ... in the meantime unbeknownst to myself she's put me on loudspeaker so that another colleague of hers can hear what's going on .. later on in the call I find out .. I'm not happy she's done this because it's her account details, I don't want to go divulging stuff to her and have someone else listen in .. and did I authorise for someone else to listen in on the call ? HELL NO!!!

In the end the call ends in a fairly nasty fashion, she's heading off to the TIO, as her account is used for business purposes, and since she's had it disconnected she's losing business ... I add my notes in that I have repeatedly advised the customer to go visit the store to ID but she has refused and that I'm sticking to my policy and procedure ...


So what part of "I can't help you because I am unable to ID you" does she NOT get ??!!

[LillFilly]

That's weird. So she just wasn't giving the correct answers that you had on-record to prove she was the person on the account? She probably forgot the answers to her own questions!

[bainsidhe]

Depends on the type of questions. I've had the bank confirm my date of birth, purchase habits such as where I last used my card, etc.

[tollbaby]

Willing to bet it was her secretary My boss used to have me do stuff like that all the time. Difference was, I was smart enough to have him legally authorize me to access his account details, so I didn't have to pretend to be someone else.

[HuNt3R]

I made sure everything was ok what happens when a customer's details are entered into the system incorrectly, it can lead to an issue such as this. It was merely her date of birth was out by a few years, and if there's no record of her correct date of birth on system anywhere we cannot successfully ID, and then need to send 'em to store where someone CAN ID etc.

It's just a way of covering ourselves

[Dips]

I bet anything the SC gave a fake birthday in some misguided attempt to protect her privacy. Then forgot about it when she needed it to verify her identity.

We run into similar issues with customers who register software using a fake name and then forget what name they used. That doesn't go well when they call in using their real name and find out I can only give a key to the actual registered licensee.

And it's never their fault when they get caught out by their own not-so-cunning schemes.

[CrazedClerkthe2nd]

I ran into this all the time at the call center. We adopted a system whereby the only way we could get into your account was either by a 6 to 10 digit PIN or the answer to a security question. That's ALL WE COULD USE. No birthdates, no phone numbers, no SSNs, just the PIN or answer to the question.

Of course if the customer couldn't provide either we couldn't talk to them and, like OP, a supervisor would not take the call unless the person had been verified and the reason for the call had been established (although they would occasionally jump on an unverified call if it had been running long). I also had many customers get pissy at me because they had to go to the store to ID.

The security question thing was a mess though. A lot of times a sales rep at the store would arbitraily set the security question/answer for the customer and NOT TELL THEM about it, which was lovely, or the customer would go online to set the question up themselves and screw it up. Of course if they didn't know the PIN or answer to the question, they had to go to the store.