please empty your brain below

Dell Hell. Been there.

Now why isnt this funny? Hmm, maybe because I have spent the last two weeks trying to get through to Surrey County Council who seem to have one employee (who is not available). And they have the most terrrrrible music to listen to for 20 minutes at a time. The same three seconds or so repeated at nauseam.

Spot on.

You need counterscript

How true! I can never remember the password I set up umpteen years ago either!
Isn't it always the case that you have to explain your problem several times before they understand and even then you can almost hear them flicking through the script book to give you the nearest company spec answer.

You've got it wrong.
There is no way that you don't get cut off (probably deliberately) when they try to transfer you.
Then you start all over again.

Two words: Lloyds TSB

Yesterday's simple query took 21 minutes, the useless, workshy gits.

In reality the number is almost certainly an 0870 number which is about 8p a minute. Often the call is to sort out a mess created by them for which you pay the privilege. Incompetance pays !

This is Talk Talk right?

Different language, but the same result.


Ever brought a bed from Dreams? I had to go thought call-management hell with them, but the best part is... all their hold music has a "Dream" connection! I had:

Daydream believer
Dreams by Gabrielle
I have a Dream (abba)

...I could go on. I gave up after 45 minutes and wrote to them instead - far quicker and it reduced my suicidal thoughts!

I used to work in "The World Greatest Call Centre" (seriously, we had an award) and we were trained, as opposed to reading from a script. We also had no menus, once you got through the queue, then you were in.

The worst one I've ever had the misfortune to deal with was Paypal. Everything is automated, except for one method of actually speaking to people.

So Timely. I've lost about a week of my life over the last few months with the hell that is NTL (sorry - my mistake - the new 'customer-friendly' Virgin Media). I can't even begin to describe the many many ways they make my life a misery, all compounded by the fact that there is no real alternative for me, so I can't even get the satisfaction of telling them exactly what I think of them.

I called t-mobile last night asking when i could give notice on my phone, they said you can call us on th 15th to give 30 days notice. "Oh can I just give you more notice than than that now?" "no you have to call again" "whatever" 'click'.

Ah, so you've been calling Sky recently as well?

I always wondered why they ask you to choose this option and then that suboption when, when you come to speak to someone, they never know why you are calling. I had imagined, naively, that the person to whom you eventually speak has a little thing up on their screen that says "this person chose option 1 and then option 6, so they probably want to talk about X".

Eventually I realised that it was just a ploy to make you think you were on hold for less time than you actually were.

Yes, do please use our website to contact us. What, an email address? Don't be silly, we couldn't trust you with one of those. Instead, we have a tiny little box for you to fill out. Yes, it's a 100 character maximum, but never mind. And, of course, when (if) we reply, it'll be via a non-reply email address, so you have absolutely no chance of actually starting up a dialogue with, god forbid, a real person.

{With thanks to TFL, who this morning sent me a warning that my Oyster card will be stopped in 3 days, because they were unable to collect the money for the auto top-up. They were wrong, the money had indeed come out of my account. So I replied to the contact email they direct you to - guess what, it doesn't exist! So, it was on the website to fill out said silly box...I'm not holding my breath.}

Well yes, calling up pretty much any company these days is a total nightmare.

The options don't work, the reps are in Guatemala, they're not multi-skilled, and you have to wait for 15 minutes to speak to someone who invariably can't help you.

Even worse is when the voice response system won't let you speak to someone, and instead sends you round and round in circles.

I, sadly, am one of the many people in this country who work in a call centre, so believe me, it's not easy from this end of the phone either. Something that annoys a customer for 10-15 minutes is invariably a permanent fixture in my list of 'things which need sorting out before I go insane'. And contrary to popular opinion, some of us do care. Not many of us, but some.

So who's got the worse deal? You or me?

It's extraordinary how hellish the whole phone enquiry culture is - I spent whole days on the 'phone with British Gas and NPower when I moved home (they managed to confuse my acccount with my neighbour's). One of these jokers has a refinement on the routine: "If you need help at any point please press *" - press * and you are immediately shunted back to the beginning of the pre-recorded options menu.

One company, based in the States, runs through the list of "pres 1 for this, press two for that," and finally you get to "press 9 to hear a duck quack." Press nine, a duck quacks and the call is disconnected.

Every company needs an option 9.

You need the code that over rides all these systems and gets you right through to an operator. Unfortunately, I always forget it (like now) hit lots of buttons and it puts me to the end of the queue.

#grr#

Enjoyed my first visit.

I complained via email to British Gas about the time it takes to speak to an operator, usually about 20 mins. It took 5 calls to get a Direct Debit form sent to my home address. They actually replied, and have credited my account with £10! I am amazed. Mind you they still havn't sorted out my Direct Debit, as they keep sending stuff to an address I had 5 yrs ago! One thing at a time. Oh, and to get round the 8p a minute thing, I opened an Alpha A/C (to phone Geoff in the U.S.A.) and all calls are 3p a minute, so use this to 'phone B.Gas. It should be a FREE NUMBER, after all you are calling them to complain about their cock-ups!

It took my hubby 30 minutes to change our address with Sky...

Yes, all sadly, sadly so true.

And strangely, as much as I hate the corporation slavery, it is only my compassion for the poor people working the phones that keeps me halfway polite.

And even more pathetic is that the level of service from some of those Indian tech support people is totally astonishing. I had one fellow who would have gladly jumped through the phone to shine my shoes if he only could.

It used to be you could claim to have a rotary phone and get connected to a real human right off... but no longer.

We're all just 'woikin' for The Man'.... because 'The Man' owns planet earth basically.

Ahh Geoff... you have my NTL sympathies! They were the only broadband provider in my area once. When my broadband stopped working and I couldn't get online I was on hold forever with the helpful pre-recorded voice telling me "why not try the help section of our website...".

Someone could get seriously rich curing the curse of the phone management system.

you'd think that the people who run/develop such phone management systems would themselves have been stuck in a queue for someone else's phone management system, and would have some smidgeon of sympathy. Or am I being unreasonably open-minded...?

http://www.saynoto0870.com/search.php

TelstraClear, the NZ alternative to Telecom (as NTL could be considered the alt to BT) have improved from the days when we first connected.
In trying to join, the installers turned up outside, knocked, and getting no reply, phoned. When I stepped outside with my cellphone and couldn't find them, it dawned on me that they were outside a house in a street with the same name as ours but in a different town...
ok, that put install a week behind.
Once installed the phone & tele worked fine, but no brdbnd. So I got on the phone. The person at the other end ran me thru all the steps that I'd already tried: reboot comp, reboot modem, etc, etc. When none of that worked they read from a script "a truck has hit a power pole in your area, causing a service outage". My disbelief was evident when I asked why my phone and cable tv worked, but not my brd band. I asked to speak to a supervisor. I was on hold for 32 minutes, during which time I had a shower, a shave and breakfast thanks to our portable phone with speaker. It turns out they did not have the correct mac number for my modem, and so were not activating it. Maybe the supervisor had more technical knowledge: he conceeded that it was unlikely that only 1 out of 3 services would be affected by a truck hitting a power pole...

Anything that does not involve paying money to Sky (such as a change of address or, heaven forbid, cancewlling a contract) only has about one or two phone operators on the section. They have, on the other hand, whole swarms of operators on sales...

'Say No to 0870' British Gas do not have an alternative number listed! I checked. I used to be able to 'phone my local Library on a local call to renew books, but oh guess what they've gone 'global' with an 0870 number. They want you to do it on-line.

And then you move between mobile phone companies and try to get the number transfer code and get hassled by the phone monkeys like you killed their pet dog. Yes VODA-FUCKING-FONE I am talking about you. Useless tits. Almost makes me wish the call centre was in India.

In the end the only solution is for me to be allowed to carry a gun an perform summary executions and retrospective abortions at my discretion.

Don't get me started on people on the top floor of the 242 bus in Hackney...AARRRRRRGHGHHH!!

I had no idea that someone operated a call centre from the top floor of a 242 bus in Hackney.

yeah, 242 bus?! Please explain.











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