One thing that is very frustrating for a customer service rep on the phone (she said, speaking from experience) is when the caller doesn't provide the information that the rep is asking for.
"Can I have your name, please?"
"Sure - my kid's name is..."
OR
"What's your provider's ID# with our company?"
"I don't have that handy, but here's his federal tax id#."
But the biggest one is when people start spelling things without pronouncing them first.
"Could I have your name, please?"
"Yup - it's S-Z-A-U-C-H-T-O-R-I-A."
Well, that's fabulous, but I have no clue how to pronounce that, so now I must resort to "sir" or "ma'am."
There's an older lady where I work, who has been on the phones for multiple years. She doesn't have the epitome of service style (ok - not even CLOSE), but she's still there... I don't know why, but maybe she just hasn't gotten caught by the right people, or something. And becuase she's been there, taking calls for so long, she doesn't have a huge amount (ok - NONE) of patience left for people who don't answer her questions the way that she wants.
Overheard from her cube a little while ago.
"I asked you for your name, and all I'm getting is an onslaught of letters!"
H-O-L-Y M-A-C-K-E-R-E-L!!
3 comments:
Lindsay, I love your faux name. VERY clever!
Lisa
You gave me a nice giggle just before bed with this one. Thanks.
Ooh, it drives me so crazy when people spell instead of tell their names! You NEED the whole word up front to give you context. Who really cares how it's spelled, anyway. 3/4 of the junk mail we receive is spelled wrong. Someone wrote our name wrong during the house-buying process, and now all the people who bought that list have it wrong too. It was by accident, but it worked out so well that I think I should just advise all my friends to purposely misspell their names on their closing contracts - you may lose your title when the mistake is discovered, but at least you'll have a much better job of going through junk mail in the meantime!
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