Friday, July 6, 2007

Massacring A Horse Graveyard

Please just answer the question!
"Can I please have your first and last name?"
"Yeah, the call is for Sandra O'Day, that's my wife."
"Oh, okay, and can I please have your first and last name?"
Slowly: "Sandra... O'Day. That's my wife."
"I know, and thank you, but I really just need your first and last name, please."
"Yeah, I'm just calling for my wife, Sandra O'Day, she wants to know..."

I need to know with whom I'm speaking so I know how much I can and can't tell them, and sometimes I explain this, but it doesn't really matter. You're just going to go on and repeat the same sentence over and over again until someone tells you in a polite baby voice, "Okay! I guessed everything you needed done and I did it!!!"

For instance, a customer will most likely always be told they need to present their question to another one of our dreaded departments, but they will fail to ever accept this. I think a lot of people loathe being transferred but need to realize that, naturally, the more convoluted a company's reach and capabilities get, the more departments there are going to be. Also, because most people only think about themselves (because it's human nature and American splendor, that Narcissism), they don't take the time to consider that logically one telephone representative cannot be in the billing department, a travel agent, an insurance agent, and in the fraud department all at the same time. If you can't understand that, then the mathematical formula 1+1=2 might seem pretty silly to you.

Here's where the confusion will arise when you neglect to think outside of your needs:
"Well, our Such-and-Such Department can fix exactly that for you. Do you mind holding while I transfer you to them?"
"Well, I'm just calling because such-and-such happened to me, I need such-and-such done, I don't understand why I had to such-and-such."
"Yeah, I know, that's why I'm saying, do you mind holding while I transfer you to Such-and-Such Department?"
"I just need to have such-and-such done, I don't understand why I need to such-and-such..."
And the call goes on for quite some time before they finally realize that I'm actually offering to help them. This is no exaggeration, and by no stretch of the imagination happens more often than not. It sounds hyperbolic, but I do even come across situations where I can never get a customer to acknowledge what I'm trying to do for them, so I have to at some point cut them off and transfer the call right through, though I imagine they'll be disoriented at a new voice coming on and asking how they can help. And I'm sure they'll hear nothing said to them even then as they blindly repeat themselves, until they hear a "DING!", like a timer in an old oven, when someone says, "Okay! I guessed everything you needed done and I did it!!!"