eadon gets phone rage

Trying to communicate with virtually any large organisation (whether it is a company, corporation or government service) is a nightmare. Emails are hit and miss so we often resort to phoning them. I have to do this often because these organisations usually screw up. Then the nightmare begins...

Take American Express. Alarmingly often American Express charge me interest when I have paid the entire amount on the card before the deadline. Or they fail to send me a statement, probably in the hope I will not pay the card that month and incur more interest. Shit service there from American Express. So on such occasions I rang them to complain. The phone is answered by a computer spewing recorded messages. The recorded message says "we have improved our service to make it even more efficient," or some such crap. The calls are not free so I was paying money to be told they had improved their service. That's right! They have improved their technique of siphoning money from my bank account into theirs via my phone bill. Bastards.

(To date American Express have promised to refund the interest, but they haven't. Instead they have erroneously charged me yet more interest. When I complained (again) they claimed they have no record of my previous complaints, but promised they will refund the interest. It might be easy to suppose that American Express are allegedly incompetent or fraudulent - or both).

American Express are not the only contact centre villains out there. I have lost count of the times I have contacted companies and corporations only to be bounced back and forth between different "departments", usually getting disconnected somewhere along the way. The phone bill skyrockets...

Imagine you need to ring customer services to sort out a horrible disaster that is the fault of Corporation XYZ. With a sense of dread strong enough to curdle the contents of your stomach into cheese, you dial their call center...

"Thank you for ringing Corporation XYZ [drones the computer]. We are the greatest. We are just fantastic. Your call is very important to us . To help us to improve your comfort and to enhance our service and for training purposes and to ensure world peace and good will to all men your call may be monitored and a transcript sent to unscrupulous bulk-emailing companies for analysis. Please press the star key on your phone twice. Please select one of the following six million options. Please press ONE if you wish to buy something. Please press TWO if you are thinking of buying something. Please press THREE if you wish to talk to one of our wonderful sales representatives. Please press FOUR if you don't want to talk to a sales representative but are getting so impatient that you will be put through to a wonderful sales representative anyway just so that you can talk to a human being even though he will only try to sell you one of our amazing products... Please press blah blah blah... [an aeon passes] Please press SIX MILLION if you wish to speak to our part time ex-McDonalds moron's answering machine in our *ahem* customer service department [the computer laughs in a hysterically as you press SIX MILLION into your phone]. Please type in ALL the numbers on all your credit cards forwards, backwards and in ascending order. For your own security, please type in your date of birth, your mothers maiden name, your preferred sexual positions and your entire life history. Thank you. I will now put you through our [sniggers] Customer Services department. [Vivaldi plays for five minutes]. Your call is very important to us. Please hold whist we contemptuously ignore your call. [Vivaldi plays for five more minutes]. Your call is very important to us. Please hold whist we contemptuously ignore..."

No one answers. Eventually you cut your losses (your phone bill will run into six figures) and hang up. You look at the time with disbelief, it was morning when you rang these bastards.. Peering out of the window you see that it is dark outside. It is dark! You are terminally late for your job interview / your date with a surreally gorgeous member of the opposite sex / your wedding / your loved one's funeral / your second coming (if you are Christ) / [insert important occasion here].

This call centre/contact centre game is a cheap way for corporations to shrug off customers who try to complain about what a rotten service they have received. As a bonus it is an opportunity for the corporation to make some money from the victim's (sorry - customer's) phone bill whilst they're at it. Some corporations even inflict you with adverts whilst you are on hold. (Ads screw up my day, I boycott companies that force ads on me).

More often than not I am in an amicable frame of mind when I phone a contact center. By the time I finally reach a human being (IF I finally get through to a human being) I am usually in such a foul mood that the poor drone taking my call usually has a hard time dealing with my phone rage. For any punk listening in "for training purposes" I probably provide the classic example of the "difficult" customer. I expect I am portrayed asThe Caller From Hell. Or something less polite than that.

Hey, I'm the victim here! Modern life can hurt. I suffer from Contact Centre Rage. Is it just me? Leave a comment below.

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From:	Stewart Vardaman	Subject:	Annoyances	2002-04-07 17:56:25

From:	Richard	Subject:	American express	2002-07-09 09:58:48

From:	devnull	Subject:	NTL	2002-10-01 12:07:33

From:	John	Subject:	Phone Rage	2004-12-31 23:45:46

From:	Vishal	Subject:	Call centres	2005-10-13 12:22:11

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Contact Centre Phone Rage