Rant and Rave 

Phone Rage

I decided I needed a space to get out my frustrations, just for me, to be able to move on after getting it out.  If it helps someone else in the process, funtastic.   Doesn't it seem as though some days, negative situations just seem to go on and on, one mishap after another in a chain of frustrating happenings? This is why I need a Rant and Rave section, today is the first entry.

Maybe it's just me but I find more and more often I get frustrated with today's phone centre software.  You know the drill, you call a utility company, a bank, or any place really, and you never get what you need even though you research and look for the right number or department before you dial.

Next are the endless recordings and prompts to select 1 for blah blah blah, 2 for blah blah.... and so on and so on. Sometimes after going through them all, there is still no option to speak to a live body, so you select the 0 hoping to get a live person and either get put into the que with the "we're experiencing a high level of calls and appreciate your patience, etc.....recording" or you get the unnerving click and recording "your call cannot be completed as dialled" and cut off.

NO! Now you have to call back and go through it all again.  Endless circles of prompts and nobody there.  Sometimes if you're lucky, you get through to a live person only to be transferred again to a voice mail or the wrong person who asks you for all your information again that you just gave to the first person.

Or, what about the times they get your info wrong, and despite correcting them every time you call, they still have it wrong and insist they will have it corrected this time, but never do.

Or, my favourite, the voice recognition software.  You speak into the phone and they ask you "Is this what you said? If so press 1?"  THESE DRIVE ME NUTS!  It rarely asks what you are calling about, so it gets you nowhere or they keep reminding you to visit their website, well duh, the reason I am calling is because of a problem on their website or because you can't find it there. Sigh.

Teams of people spend endless time wanting to get the best customer service and yet if they would just get rid of the damn software in the first place and go back to good old people talking to you on the first ring, and who aren't reading from a scripted answer like a robot;  customers wouldn't be angry and frustrated when they finally get through to someone and rage at them causing high turnover in employees leaving for stress or because they can't deal with angry people on the phone all day who have to stay on hold for ever after battling with the endless prompts and recorded unsolicited advertising.  Then you go to the place in person and see that they have multiple people working at the reception desk talking to each other, but the software answering the phones.

I avoid calling cell phone companies, utility and insurance companies etc, probably costing me more money in the end;  just to avoid the stress of going through this!