The other day we asked readers to vent about those cliched phrases they hate to hear from the mouths of customer service reps. And boy-howdy did you vent. Now it’s time to hear from someone who works in the trenches as a CSR about those tired tropes he’s sick of hearing customers utter over the phone.
The reader–let’s call him Jim– works at a call center for a credit union and wrote us to share a few of his least favorite customer statements:
1. “I have been with your bank for XX amount of time”
We know. We look at your account history.
2.“I will take my money elsewhere”
Go ahead, it really does not bother us. Honestly. You never do or if you do you will come back. Unless of course you are carrying a very hefty deposit.
3. “Last time you guys did this and that”
That was last time sir/ma’am. We look at everything on a case by case basis or just our mood.
4. “I have a close relationship with your CEO”
Chances are you do not, but if you feel inclined to say that, please provide some proof other than his name. We do not fall for that.
5. “I’ll Sue”
Boy we love to hear this. It almost makes the call worthwhile. We laugh all day at your expense, basically you make the mistake and try to blame us for it. Classic! We have a team of lawyers who we do pay a boatload of cash to make things go away. They are professionals, but try us.
More from Jim:
It’s not that we are not empathetic or sympathetic to your situation, sometimes this job does not allow for compassion as we are on a time constraint (i.e., We have a 3 to 4 minute talk time that we can spend with you; anymore time we spend and we are basically getting a reprimand at a later date or on our performance evaluations), so please excuse me for not making small talk and asking how the kids are doing.
I genuinely want to help but do not skirt around the issue be upfront and clear. When I ask you for your account number please do not reply with “oh man you know what I left that in my wallet in my pants after dinner last night and I was so tired this morning I forgot to bring my wallet with me”. You either have it or you don’t.
Next point: Do not get mad when I verify your information. It’s part of the process and I have no control over that. Do you want identity theft? No, guess what — we do not either, so we do this to try and salvage some of that.
Now when it comes to your issue or question please get to it. No need for a long backstory unless it really does have to deal with your problem.
Third, if I can solve it for you I will. I place you on hold just to update notes and sometimes clear with our supervisor especially if we are refunding fees for you.
The supervisor or manager is always available honestly. We choose to “see” if they are available if you are being too much of an annoyance or pain. You ever notice when you want to congratulate us one is always available and when you are being difficult (yelling or screaming) they are not?
Also, please and thank you go a long way…
To address that whole “my manager will tell you the same thing” is because they will. In general we are more compassionate than our managers who have been at the position for a longer time than we have been working and are jaded and spiteful. Your best solution is just to deal directly with a lowly Customer Service Rep. We still have compassion.
Simply put, when you are calling in do not make small time. I do not have the time and I am sure you do not either…
Ask for the solution you want; if we can accommodate you we will. If not we will try to find a middle ground. Third, the manager really is not a good option. Us bottom feeders are best. We are still human, and please extend the same courtesies we extend to you, it will make things smoother and easier and faster, so we can get you off the phone and on to the next poor sap.
What do you think of Jim’s comments? We’d especially love to hear from those of you who work or have worked in call centers.
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“The supervisor or manager is always available honestly. We choose to “see” if they are available if you are being too much of an annoyance or pain. You ever notice when you want to congratulate us one is always available and when you are being difficult (yelling or screaming) they are not? “
So even if I don’t like the CSRs response, instead of arguing I will thank them for being considerate and polite and attempting to be helpful. I will then ask to pass on my words of praise to their manager. And that when I stick it to ‘em!
Right, you suck it up and eat the shitty food because you know if you send it back, it’s going to get spit in. Then you take it out of the tip when you leave. Same thing. The waiter spits in your food, the CSR (metaphorically) spits in your face.
…..And get the CSR screamed at by the supervisor for not giving the supervisor correct information. THANKS! Love you too!
2.”I will take my money elsewhere”
Go ahead, it really does not bother us. Honestly. You never do or if you do you will come back. Unless of course you are carrying a very hefty deposit.
Funny how for all the piling on of this guy, no one calls him out on this point. Because we all know its (almost always) true.
I have another, courtesy of my days as a CSR
#8
Customer who has been transferred: “I FINALLY get to talk with you. I’ve been on hold for FIFTEEN MINUTES. You should give me a discount just for keeping me waiting for so long.”
Second-Level CSR: “Umm… That’s funny. Our system logs these calls and it says Mandy transferred you at 7:51. That’s a little under three minutes ago. But I’m sorry to have kept you
waiting for that long, I was helping another customer who needed second tier support.”
Customer: “Oh. Well, anyway…”
Don’t care! I’m not in business to serve you.
I don’t agree with everything but I’ve done customer service for American Express, the USPS line, and a small-town newspaper circulation. I do not enjoy call center work. I think the above list gets some of it, but the commentary can rub people the wrong way. Here’s how I’d put it, less as a means to blame the customer but to explain things.
- “I have been a customer since…” / “Do you know how much money I have spent?”
Amex customers often asked me to do the latter. I understand why they’re doing this — they want you to understand how they feel, that a relationship they have valued, as a customer, is suddenly not pleasing them. They’re not necessarily attempting to throw their weight around. They’re telling you that they usually LIKE dealing with the company you represent. I’m sorry you’re suddenly having a bad experience with us.
2.”I will take my money elsewhere”
I’m not like the original poster who doesn’t care. My job was to not upset customers but, at the same time, uphold the rules given to us by the company we represent. One reason call center work can be so frustrating is that you’re given a limited set of options for appeasing a customer, including the option to have your call escalated. I’ve been on call center floors where I spent a long time with an unhappy customer on hold and my hand raised because the caller wants a manager and I’m unable — I honestly can’t change it in the computer — to fix a problem. I have my own frustrations — they discourage us from escalating calls, ask us to write out tickets rather than get a manager on the phone, or come after us for call times, even when a customer has a complicated issue.
I can’t even agree with you when I think a company’s policy is unfair and crappy and costs them customers.
3. “Last time you guys did this and that”
Unfortunately, policies change, permissions change, and there is high turnover in call centers. If the system used by the call center lets us record histories, that can be helpful, but not all do. Often your company contracts out call center works and goes through different CSR agencies over time — so the team that handled your account last year may be working for a totally different company now.
(And one reason call time is so important — your CSR is probably working for a contracted group that’s trying to attract and keep contracts by assuring the company that we’ll handle a certain volume of calls in a certain amount of time with only so many employees. It’s definitely a quantity over quality situation.)
4. “I have a close relationship with your CEO”
Should that be the case, I recommend communicating directly with the higher-ups. As I said above, often the CSR isn’t a direct employee of the company he or she represents. They are working for a contracted telecommunications agency or temporary employment agency. Often, we’ll have a page in our notebook with the mailing address of the company HQ, but we have no means of accessing their office. We’re bottom of the ladder.
5. “I’ll Sue”
I haven’t heard this before, but I’ve never sat around laughing about any calls. You really do get so many in an eight-hour day that they all blur together. If someone did threaten to sue the company, I’d give them the mailing address for company HQ. I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t know if they have a case or not.
Honestly, my biggest frustration was from within, not without. I hated having such limited authority to assist or appease the customer, while at the same time being scolded for trying to escalate any calls to my manager.
At the same time, you’re expected to make sales even on an inbound call, much like the BOFA CSR who had to sell products to a caller closing her deceased mother’s account. I even had to upsell soda and salad as a teenaged CSR for a Pizza Hut and was busted when HQ called and tested me. But I always figured if a longtime PH customer wants a soda or a salad, they’d order one. Judging from most posts on here, customers don’t really dig upsells.
Wow, if I had a company and I found out Jim was working for me he would be immediately moved to a job where he did not interact with customers. Janitorial, grounds keeping, maintenance, or something like that. I do not not a person like this turning away a customer just because of his mood. The first two things he complains about are details any good business owner would want their employees to consider when dealing with customers.
Your CSR’s attitude about suing is part of the reason (imo) that they need to pay a “team of lawyers a boatload of money” to make things go away.
case in point: I spent 6+hours begging Dell CSR’s to honor the terms of my warranty contract to the letter rather than whatever spirit they or their trainers thought the contract actually contained.
I ended up filing suit and rather than the $75 upgrade compromise I was asking the CSRs for, dell (through it’s lawyer paid a boat load of money) cashed me out for a bit more than 25times what I was asking for.
But, you had a legitimate complaint, based on a warranty/contract that they were failing to honour.
It might surprise you, but ‘I’ll sue!’ is almost never over something THAT cut and dried. Like the guy who threatened to sue because HE started a fire by hanging things off his hydro lines outside. Okay Sir, I can definitely get you the number to our legal department, but I’m not really sure what you’re going to sue US for…
When I call my ISP and tell them I can’t sign onto Usenet, DON’T tell me to call Usenet about it!
Don’t make me call every day for 3 days in a row, telling me the (web) server is fine, it must be “Usenet’s” problem or my computer is screwed up. Just let me talk to the tech guy, who just happened to KNOW what Usenet is and had it fixed within 10 minutes, once I was able to speak to him, after THREE days of talking to idiots.
Same thing happened with the password server once, the idiot says there is nothing wrong with the (web) server, let’s delete and reinstall your software. I say it’s not my software I can’t sign on with Hyper Terminal either, the problem is YOUR PASSWORD SERVER. I ended up hanging up on that one, too. When I tried to connect a couple of hours later and it worked, without deleting or reinstalling anything on my system, there was a notice on the ISP website that the password server was working again.
The biggest problem I see from the CSR’s posting here is that they see themselves as assisting customers in problems of their own making. In many cases (most I would hazard to guess) the customers are calling because a business is not supplying what they were paid to supply. In those cases the CSR’s are not helping the customer in the traditional sense, rather they should see themselves as helping their business retain a customer and every person that customer talks to.
For example I would like to believe that I have negatively affected Holiday Inn Express’s business as a result of their “Help” desk having failed to respond to my e-mails, calls, and letters about them completely fouling up my frequent customer points account. If their “help” desk had seen themselves as helping to retain a customer perhaps they would not have me as a blood enemy for life.
I work in a call center for a more… national.. bank. Seems like some of these things are universal!
“1. “I have been with your bank for XX amount of time”
We know. We look at your account history.”
- For me, the only length of time I can see is how long a specific account has been open. I’ve seen some open since 1968, but most of the customers that claim a long-time relationship have only had their accounts open since 2008. Now, that could mean you had closed your old accounts and opened new ones for various reasons.. but I can’t verify that info, so I generally don’t consider it when making decisions and trying to help. It just depends on your situation, how you react, and what I can do to help.
“2.”I will take my money elsewhere”"
- Most people that ‘threaten’ this usually have less than two grand in the bank, total. I treat each customer the same, and if you’re threatening to leave, there’s really nothing I can do to stop you. All I can do is try to give you the correct info and try to move on from there. If you still want to leave, this is your choice.
“Next point: Do not get mad when I verify your information. It’s part of the process and I have no control over that. Do you want identity theft? No, guess what — we do not either, so we do this to try and salvage some of that.”
- Every day I will get at least one person who demands to speak to a supervisor because I cannot verify them. The biggest, BIGGEST thing I have a problem with is people who bypass the automated system, then tell me to ‘hold on’ when I ask for the same info the machine would ask for. Most of the time they have it. When you do not have a card or account number, we -have- to then use social and transaction history. Those aren’t exactly the easiest questions to answer. So please, if you call up, at least have your card number ready for when the rep gets on the phone? Why would you call up a bank, then have to hunt for your account info? Just be ready with it and then we can move on and I can answer questions.
“To address that whole “my manager will tell you the same thing” is because they will.”
- I’ve been told to actually say that phrase when it comes to fee reimbursements. In fact, they told me to just say that all fees are ‘ineligible’ for reimbursement, then put the person on hold, ask the bank system whether or not the customer can get a partial or full reimbursement, then come back with the good/bad news. Fee reimbursements have a lot of requirements – stuff like length of time with bank, average balance, number of past reimbursements, and number of overdrafts. If you meet all five, congratulations! You can have a full reimbursement. Four out of five – partial. Three out of five – ooooh, so sorry. No. Supervisors may be able to bypass this system, but they use it too. Their first step is to check your stats. Most of the time I’m careful about who I escalate upwards, and plead their case. I’ll get a waiver for you if I can. However, if you bully me into getting a supervisor on the line, that usually means you are nowhere near close to having it waived and they will 90% of the time say no. My supervisor is literally in the cubicle next to me. I think I hear him say ‘yes’ to fee waivers once a week. And he takes calls from the entire center’s escalation queue.
I just want to stress the whole ‘have your account info ready before getting on the phone with a representative’ thing – if I can’t verify you, then I’m gonna have to send you to a banking location. I can’t talk anything specific and can only speak in general terms even if you’ve given me your full social and other info. I might be able to look you up, but I don’t have the info I need to prove it’s you. Also, no, we cannot look you up by name, phone number, address, or PIN. We do NOT have access to PINs.
I keep working for this company because every now and then I’ll be saving someone from identity theft, fraud, and I’ll be helping them the best I can. I genuinely want to help you. So don’t act like a dick, and I’ll do what I can, and if I can’t do anything, I’ll either get you to someone who can, or give you what info I have available for you. Even if you treat me horribly, I’ll do what you allow me to do and I’ll at least make sure you have done what needs to be done. I’ve had people yell at me for thirty minutes straight while I’ve processed a lost check. Or set up their account correctly despite the branch not doing it right the first time. I do have a bit of professional pride, and it’s worth it when I get someone who actually says thank you. Even if most don’t.
1. “I have been with your bank for XX amount of time”
I work in a CU and when I hear this it’s bragging and I’m impressed.
The only thing common in my experience to this list is people getting upset at verifying information. When I first started, I didn’t know a single member, so I had to ask everyone and the odd one would get indignant despite not knowing who I was! Now I know most everyone, so I don’t run into that any longer.
There is really nothing like a bank/CU where nearly everyone is greeted by name when they come in.
CSRs… there is nothing wrong with telling your customers the reasoning behind a decision, unless you’re ashamed of it. There is nothing wrong with telling a customer “no” so long as you make sure they understand why and what their next step should be. There is no reason a customer should have to ask you “What would you do in my place?”. You should always be thinking that. There is no reason to treat any customer like a child or a moron. There is nothing wrong with being polite to difficult customers. There is no virtue in being shitty to people. Grow up already. Be a human being.
I’m honestly not sure if you deal with the general public in a call centre, because even doing those things does not stop certain people from being giant asshats.
I once had a customer who had no phone service. He refused to troubleshoot, and I had already totally exhausted what could be done from the office. Our Phone repair crew was already overbooked, and the earliest we could get him in was later the next evening, and this was AFTER I personally went through two separate escalated support departments trying to overbook this for him. Like, literally begging and pleading with our senior support and dispatch for the earliest possible appointment. And I explained that to him, that we could get the techs out at that point but no earlier, because there just physically *weren’t* enough techs available.
He still yelled, screamed, told me I was lying, demanded an escalation, and also demanded I cancel several other customer’s calls so he could be bumped up in the queue. Yeah, he got his escalation. And no, he didn’t get an earlier spot because as I’d explained to him, I’d already exhausted every possible attempt to try get his call booked sooner. He was already being credited for the time out AND inconvenience. It was a crappy situation, but even the reality didn’t stop him from being incredibly abusive towards me.
So, because you’re perfect, how would you have handled that?
I’m so tired of hearing “Hello this Dorothy Rosebloom from 12 wildwood Rd windham NH 03087 and…” Yeah I totally know who you are “YEAH HELLO DOROTHY HOW ARE THINGS!!?? HOWS MR. ROSEBLOOM!!?”
Shut the fuck up and get to the point dude.
haha at my job too, people do this. “Hi this is Victoria Smith from Iowa.” then they do like a 30 second pause, like I’m supposed to say OMG HI!!!!!! I remember you. Also I get a lot of “I think I talked to you before.” No. No you didn’t. “Yes!!! It was you.” and like we do this whole 2 minute thing where she’s insisting I’ve talked to her before. Ugh.
5. “I’ll Sue”
When I was a phone support rep for a company that offered a private line of credit, I used to love to hear this one. It was one of the few instances where we had a strict script to follow: “Yes sir/ma’am, please hold while I transfer you to our switchboard operator, and you’ll need to ask for Legal.”
Of the past, oh 50 calls where I’ve had to escalate something past a (usually awful) front-line CSR, I’ve gotten what I asked for probably 45 out of 50 times. And of those 50 calls, on probably 48 of them, the CSR assured me that “My supervisor will tell you the same thing and won’t be able to help you”.
Oh, and in one case, the supervisor insisted that what I wanted wasn’t possible and he was going to make notes on my account to ensure that no one else would do what I was asking for. It took an additional 10 or 15 minutes to call back and get somebody competent and not only get what I had asked for, but to reach the call center manager and file a formal complaint against the arrogant and unhelpful supervisor.
“I have a close relationship with your CEO”
Not true. Customers are, however, quite capable of writing formal (US Mail) letters of complaint to a company’s CEO. I’ve done it, with excellent results.
As a CSR with the same co for 8 years, but with different clients (the dreaded outsourced employee—we’re in the States!), we’re required to: Say hello; Ask you what your issue is; Tell you we’ll be happy to look into that for you. If we place you on hold, we’re supposed to ask if you will hold, give you an idea of how long the hold will be, put you on hold, come back from hold in the amount of time we specified and thank you for holding. Then we can go ‘free form’. After getting details and fixing or trying to fix the issue, we’re REQUIRED to make you one of 3 or 4 ‘upsells’ showing on our screen for you per the script on the upsell. When we’re finished with your stated issue, we’re supposed to ask you if there is anything else we can assist with, we’re supposed to thank you for calling and being our customer.
Is it ‘scripted’? No, they haven’t given us a set script to follow, but we ARE supposed to follow the above formula. When you have to talk to 60-75 people a day in an 8 hour shift and solve all their problems? You create your own ‘script’. The above? It’s easy:
“Thank you for calling XYZ, my name is Sunshine, how may I help you today? I’ll be happy to look into your widget for you today, Mr. Smith. While I’m accessing my information, how’s your day going today? Great! I see here that although you have A-B-C business with us, we do not handle D-E-F for you. Have you thought of moving your D-E-F to us? We can offer you these benefits. Not interested? Thank you for letting me tell you about that product. Now, on your widget…(insert free form)
Ok, Mr. Smith, we’ve taken care of your widget for you. Just to summarize, we have (go over AGAIN what has been done), do you understand? Great! Is there anything else I can assist you with today? Thank you for calling XYZ!”
The quasi-scripting makes it easier. What’s tough about it? I’d love to talk on the phone all day, you may be thinking. Think again.
Listen to people who want the world for free (TANSTAAFL!) 60-75 times in a standard work day with cussing, threats of bodily injury and the customer’s refusal to admit they did anything wrong, and then start complaining about customer service reps. The first time you get someone telling you their account is overdrawn all over town but they didn’t MEAN to bounce that check with you, you should just forgive them the $25 NSF fee and all late fees even though this is the 6th time in 12 months this has happened? You’ll run screaming into the night never to return.
OH, and muffle the screaming parrot, barking dog and children when you call. I can’t hear you over YOUR background noise.
Fact: If you know the CEO/President/Someone important on any kind of personal level you would be talking to them, not me; OR they would have asked me to call you.
I’ve worked for a couple of call centers, doing a few different things, and I gotta disagree with the “if your being a pain in the ass, a supervisor won’t be available” To be honest, getting a sup call can be the highlight of my day- if, like at one call center the supervisor had to come and take over my phone, while I got an extra break!
My personal biggest peeve is being called Ma’am. I’m not 90! I gave you my name, if your gonna call me anything call me that! (and ask if you forget, really, I don’t mind!)
Second biggest peeve is people that don’t know what they are calling for, or how to get what they need. I am not allowed to suggest you speak to a supervisor, even if I know they can help. You need to voice that! Don’t be afraid to!
I find, that while supervisors will agree with pretty much anything a CSR says its not so much that they “less human” but more as a “company solidarity” type thing.
If I’m making small talk about the weather or what have you- I’m have computer problems and I’m not allowed to tell you. Go with it, I get in trouble if there is to much dead air!
People who call in while driving are the WORST, since you can hear the car moving, and they never have the correct info on them. As well, several of the call center jobs I have had are for tech support. You can’t do tech support while driving!
And thats another thing! If your calling in for tech support, know the name of the product and have it near by!
- Just My 2 Cents
I worked a call center in my early 20s.
Several of the things “Jim” complains about are beyond the CSR’s control. Unreasonably short ideal call times, for instance, or asking for the customer to verify his identity eight times. I get the frustration of having to abide by a foolish policy you didn’t set. But while these policies are not the CSR’s fault, they are not the customer’s fault, either. Taking it out on the customer is not going to help. Both customer and CSR are kind of stuck in the same hell when it comes to all this.
Also, while I agree that many things have to be evaluated on a case by case basis, it is not unreasonable for the customer to expect X to happen again when X happened the first time. I mean, it’s actually quite logical. And yes, it is true that responses will change by CSR mood, that is also not the customer’s fault and the customer certainly can’t be expected to plan for it.
Another tip: If you want a refund.. be honest and ask politely. “Sorry, I messed up do you think you could help me out?” will go much farther than “I HATE YOU GUYS IM GONNA CALL THE NEWS AND THE ATTORNEY GENERAL AND TELL EVERYONE I KNOW TO CANCEL MY ACCOUNT”.
Sometimes the squeaky wheel does get the grease but sometimes the squeaky wheel just gets replaced. There are plenty of other customers in line, we won’t go under if you leave. If you are an asshole, we will do all we can to ensure you do not get that refund.
Ha. I was a CSR for a very, *very* small company. I dealt with the calls all day and became less sympathetic (not in a mean way, just not falling over myself to give away discounts and whatnot). My supervisor was the business owner and she would do *anything* to keep a customer. I understand that need, but she put up with so much awful shit from the few very irate customers who called. If someone called me horrible names I wouldn’t repeat in front of my children, I wouldn’t offer them a significant discount – I would tell them sorry we couldn’t do business with them anymore and hang up. But I guess that’s why I don’t own a business.
2.”I will take my money elsewhere”
Everyone from the lowest on the totem pole to the top of the company would love for bad customers to take their business elsewhere.
I’m not referring to people who are rude and unpleasant as bad customers. Bad customers are people whose patronage is harmful our business. Reasonable customers, whether unpleasant or not, can are usually given a satisfactory solution.
Businesses are out to make money. If you cost them more than you make them, yes, they would rather see you take your business elsewhere.
One thing that really irks me is when the system says I need to enter in my account number for example. And then when I talk to an actual human, they ask for it again. Why? I’ve already given you guys that.
Along the same line, just the other day when I was talking to my mortgage holder, I had to give my information 3 times! Name, address, phone number, etc. Why does each person have to verify that it’s me on the phone? Especially if the person A hands my call over to person B and stays on the line to explain to person B the situation?!?!? Person A was just on the line telling you who I am and why I’m calling!
It’s frustrating.
That’s bad internal transferring. It’s called cold transferring, and should NEVER be done. Believe me, we hate it as much as you do. If you’ve already confirmed all your account information, they should be speaking with the other department directly and bringing them up to date before they hit Transfer. Personally, I never cold-transfer, especially since my transfer line will connect me with the first available CSR/TSR, so I’m generally not waiting any longer than 30 seconds to get someone in any other department.
“they should be speaking with the other department directly and bringing them up to date before they hit Transfer”…but they do! That’s what bugs me. Like the BOA example I gave. The one person actually stayed on the line. Both of them were on the line. She got the one guy on the line while I was on hold, explained what was going on and then brought me on. She said, this is so-and-so and he’s going to help you. And then, again, I had to verify I was who I said I was. Annoying!
While it’s very disheartening to hear that basically everyone has a crappy experience calling [American] call centres, I’d be interested to know if those same people advocate verbally abusing TSRs/CSRs the second they answer the phone – because I’m sorry to say, it seems like they do.
I don’t work off a script and I don’t lie to my customers. I’m empowered to pretty much do ANYTHING I want for the customer, within reason, and I do on a regular basis. I like my job, I like fixing things, and I honestly wish I could fix *everything* over the phone and never need to roll a truck. [As it is, we STILL have the shortest wait times in Canada for repair calls and our average speed of answer on the phones is 40 seconds to a minute]. I’m good at my job, I genuinely enjoy it, and the company I work for is constantly training us on customer service and trying to improve customer engagement as well as employee engagement.
And yet… I STILL get customer who are rude to the point of abusive on the phones. I still get people who scream at me or call in looking specifically to pick a fight, even if they don’t have any problems with their services [the last angel screamed 'YOU SON OF A BITCH!' in to the receiver the second I answered, very nice]. I wish maybe for once, people would see that even great companies with good policies and helpful, empowered employees STILL have to deal with customers who are rude, abusive, outrageous, or even irrational, and that it’s not always ‘our fault’.
But hey, what do I know, I just work in a call centre. I’m not human, or anything.
The threat to sue is not always funny to the CSR
One time, a friend had a few problems with a CSR, I went with him to find a resolution to the problem and the worker was nasty and refused to do what was right and what was in their power. He threatened to sue, the CSR told him off, a few weeks later, the CSR was gone when a higher up in the company had to show up in small claims over a problem that could have been fixed in less than a minute.
If you threaten to sue and you have documentation on your side, be ready to follow through. For me or any of my friends, if there is a threat to sue, take it seriously as there is a 99% chance that it will happen if the problem cant be resolved in a civilized manner and the worker blocks me when up my way to the chain of command. If there is a major problem and I cant get into contact with a higher up when all other workers are reluctant, the higher ups will see me one way or another.
My solution, provide the info needed for an EECB if you hide the info then higher ups will end up with a less pleasant way of getting contacted.
Most of this is true except the manager part. Those the ones that don’t help are, more often than nnot, in their job for the wrong reasons. If you’re nice I’ll get the person that knows what they’re doing and can bend the rules. If you’re a jerk then you get the VP’s buddies with three months experience and a god complex.
When I was working collections/repo for a small-town bank, I loved it when people would threaten to “take all my business to another bank” while I was repossessing their car or trying to collect a payment from them. My response was ALWAYS “Promise?”
I find the premise that this is a “typical CSR” totally ridiculous. Most CSRs don’t look at account history and consumerist.com is a testament that mood is more of a factor than policy, both good and bad.
Dead on. I worked for Sprint for 5 years and all of my supervisors were far less generous than I was.
They make sense, I worked for an airline reservations company and time is limited on calls. people want to be coddled because they are who they are,to a CSR it’s just another name in 500 or more for that shift nothing personal,but they are people too and are working within the parameters given them by their boss. Please and thank you are not usually said to a CSR so that is nice to hear once in a while And never talk down to a CSR that will be in the notes forever
and read during every call you make. Supervisors don’t have to be on the floor at all times so when they say that the supervisor is not available they may be telling the truth…..
I once had a fun hour with a CSR at a major bank because she wouldn’t transfer me to a manager, but she couldn’t hang up the phone on me either. She had to wait until I said that there was nothing else that she could do for me –
Me: I’d like to talk to a manager.
Her: I’m sorry one is not available. Is there anything else I can do for you today?
Me: Yes, you can let me speak to a manager.
Her: I’m sorry one is not available. Is there anything else I can do for you today?
And repeat.
She finally got so frustrated after an hour that she put me on hold for about 10 minutes and than came back and transferred me to a manager, who was able to solve my problem.
I never got mad, she never got mad, we were always pleasant to each other, but I wasn’t going to get off the phone until my problem was solved, which she couldn’t do it, and she wasn’t going to hang up on a customer, but was under orders not to transfer calls to the manager.
I won.
I’ve worked in customer service envionments with primary point of contact being face to face, but am currently work in a call center like workplace. My position is a non-production one, which means minimal phone contact.
If “Jim” works in a call center, I really doubt that he is a lower level CSR who is one the phone most of the time. I would guess that he started out as a CSR and worked his way up to a supervisor or manager position. Most of my co-workers who are really good at their jobs don’t want to be in a supervisory position because of they are good at their jobs and the pay increase isn’t worth the extra hassels from both clients and corporate. I’m not saying that “Jim” wasn’t a good CSR, but management in call centers tends to consist of those burned out by constant contact with people. Most CSRs from my experience working and as a customer dealing them tend to be women, rather than men.
I know from experience that you become very cynical and sarcastic when working in a customer service environment, but you save that for your co-workers who get it. It’s unprofessional to let that attitude show in person or in your voice over the phone. We all know how dumb people can be, but you try your best to find a solution for the person you’re helping. If he let that attitude show, then he probably wouldn’t last too long in most places.
As someone who has had experiences with call centers, my least favorite ones to call are ones in the South. I’m from the Midwest and have no accent, so I really have trouble understanding Southern accents. I hated calling my former insurance company for that reason. I could understand the people who worked in Dell’s India call centers better than I could people who worked in call centers in the US South. I know customer service is a loss leader for most companies, but they could at least make sure that the CSRs they hired were understandable and didn’t have a heavy accent. When I cancelled, they asked for the reason and other than their poor coverage, I told them that I had trouble understanding their CSRs.
To CSRs – I’ve managed a call center before. I know that some of the above is BS, and some of it is true. However…
I don’t give a rat’s ass if you can only spend a few minutes with me. It’s your job to resolve a problem, not to get me off the phone as quickly as possible without resolving it. If you can’t resolve it, send me up to a manager immediately. Guess what? It gets me off your phone. Or if it takes longer, it takes longer. Tough. I’ve fired CSRs who are taking too long on EVERY SINGLE CALL, and I’ve fired CSRs who care only about the technical requirements and don’t do a bit of good. But I’ve never held a certain percentage of tough calls taking longer against a CSR. Neither will any other halfway competent manager. If you really have an asshat for a supervisor, you’re better off getting unemployment.
Don’t. Ever. Screw. Around. When. Someone. Asks. For. A. Manager. Not unless you want to be fired for cause and lose your chances at unemployment. That crap doesn’t fly – and it gets companies very bad PR, AG complaints, suits…
Oh, yeah – and “last time” can count under the law. In some circumstances, waiving certain parts of a contract, etc. can create modifications of the parties’ duties to each other. Don’t ever assume that policy hasn’t been written a certain way for a purpose and can be “bent.” Your “whim” is never a valid reason for making a decision, either for or against a customer.
Going to post the same thing here that I posted to the other thread. If you already read this, skip it. If not, please take a minute or eight.
As a long time retail employee, I can honestly say that whenever I said “I can’t make that change in the system” it was the complete truth. Same for “I can pass you on to a manager, but she’s going to tell you the same thing.” We’re not idiots, nor are we LOOKING for a fight. In MOST cases (NOT all, but most), if we tell you we can’t change the system, it’s because we can’t. We know you’re going to whine and cry about it. We don’t want to hear it. If we could avoid it, we would. As for the manager, we say that when it applies (get the manager to change the system, for example). We don’t program our point of sale systems, and most are not NEARLY as “open to changes” as most customers seem to think.
As for our “understanding your problem” what would you prefer us to say? We have to be polite, no matter how much we want to tell you where to stick your whining and crying. So we have to say something fake like that. Do we care that you’re unhappy? Not really, other than the trouble you’re causing us. We don’t get paid enough to care. What’s that? Get another job if we don’t like retail? Right, cause entry-level jobs are so easy to get.
Stupid customers don’t seem to understand that the people who are “serving” them are underpaid and overworked people who most often don’t give a damn and don’t have real reason to give a damn. You treat us like crap, we are scheduled crap hours, and we get crap pay.
First and foremost, let me say that we, the employees of the customer service field, are human beings just like the rest of you. We have families, friends, lives, and bills. We have good times and bad, great accomplishments and horrible tragedies. Just like you, we do have emotions, and just like you, sometimes our emotions can get the best of us.
I’ve heard it said by many people that if you work in the service industry, you should be prepared to always put on a happy face and give each customer the most pleasant and wonderful shopping experience they’ve ever received. Typically, those same people say that if you aren’t prepared to perform that way, then the service industry isn’t for you. This, oh arrogant customer, is a crock.
There are very few people who work at CheapMart because their dream was to spend their career stocking shelves at CheapMart. It’s quite unlikely that the guy who makes your burger at Cheeseburger Champion does it because it was the greatest aspiration he had for his life. Sure, there are people out there like that, but the number is likely to be something like one out of every thousand. Yes, I pulled that statistic outta my head. I base it on the number of people I’ve worked with over the years. Over a decade of retail experience and I have never come across anyone who felt they were working their “dream job.”
The majority of service workers are doing the job for two reasons: They needed a job, and (insert company name here) hired them. Plain and simple.
The common notion out there seems to be that if we don’t like working customer service jobs, we should get out of that field. Right, because it’s just THAT simple! Hate to break it to you, but not everyone has a degree to get a job in their preferred field. Not everyone has the money to GET a degree in their preferred field. And while a degree isn’t necessary to get a job, the majority of the most easily accessible jobs out there that don’t require a degree involve customer service in one form or another.
For that matter, many don’t even HAVE a preferred field because they haven’t yet discovered something that they really enjoy doing. It took me four years after high school to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. In the meantime, when you’re a teenager with no work experience under your belt, who is going to hire you? The answer, of course, is the customer service industry. Sure, there are other companies here and there that might want to take a chance on an inexperienced teenager, but the majority of job opportunities come from the service field.
And that’s what most customers don’t seem to understand. We are just working our way through college. We’re working a second job to pay bills. We’re trying to buy cars, pay off student loans, pay auto insurance, etc. We’re not trying to sell you a pack of paperclips at Office Supply Land because we have some kind of absurd passion for office supply products, we’re doing it because it was the job we were offered, and it pays the bills – or some of them, anyway. You can’t expect us to be all happy-go-lucky about leading you to the toilet paper aisle or extra-sizing your french fries. It’s not exactly a very fulfilling lifestyle, but for most of us, it’s a temporary necessity. If you told an unhappy retail employee to get another job if they didn’t like customer service, they’d likely respond with, “I’d love to. Who’s hiring?”
Then there is the human factor that no one ever seems to take into account. As I said, we are people with lives just as much as you are, and we experience emotions too. I remember an incident at Computer Galaxy when I almost got in trouble because some over-sensitive customer got all upset over something that had nothing to do with her. We had three long lines at all the registers, and we were trying to get people out as fast as we could. One of our salesmen brought up a cart full of stuff – a computer, monitor, printer, cables, etc – for me to ring up. Then he decides he forgot something and runs off, telling us to wait a minute. I started to get pretty annoyed because we had a lot of people waiting and the salesman had stopped my line dead. Well, this customer saw me shaking my head slightly, and when the salesman returned, she demanded that he summon the manager because I was “huffing and puffing” over having to ring up their sale.
I didn’t have a problem with her before that, but you can be sure that AFTER she jumped to that absurd conclusion, I was pretty ticked off at her. It infuriates me how customers LOOK for things to complain about.
If an employee is taking a personal call at the cash register, most customers get annoyed. What if it is an emergency? What if they’re getting an update on a sick relative? What if the babysitter just called to tell them the electricity had been shut off? Customers have no idea what’s going on in these people’s lives, yet they whine and complain if they aren’t helped in less than thirty seconds. I refer to it as the “God Complex.” If people aren’t worshipped as gods the second they walk through the door of any business, then employees should be fired and free product showered down from the skies. That’s right; should something happen that offends them, nothing less than the unemployment line for the offending employee will satisfy. If someone loses their cool and tells you to “Shut up,” you respond by demanding that person’s job. Should the employee have said that to you? No, of course not. Should he lose the ability to pay his bills and feed his family for it? Absolutely not. We are human beings. We have emotions, and we make mistakes. Get your heads out of your rear-ends and move on with life.
And while we’re on the subject of pay, let’s talk about the money issue. Many customer service employees work two jobs. Sometimes three. Why? Because we get paid next to nothing while the world is expected of us. Take my cashier job at Computer Galaxy, for example. For $7 an hour, we were expected to sell Product Replacement Plans, Training Classes, Tech Services, Unmatched (Another phone/training service), Computer Galaxy Credit Cards, Add-on products, and internet services. The phrase “Ask Every Customer” was pounded into our heads multiple times daily. Our numbers were closely monitored, and we were ripped in half when we didn’t reach our goals. And don’t be so foolish as to think that we were given commissions or spiffs for those things. For a short time, commissions were a part of the Computer Galaxy pay structure, but they were so small it was laughable (we’re talking $10 for meeting your goals for a week), and they didn’t apply to cashiers anyway. So, given all of that, how enthusiastic and happy can you really expect an employee to be?
Office Supply Land was the same way. The only “technicians” they hired while I worked there were recent high school graduates who were not certified. Why no certification? So they could pay them $8.00 per hour, of course. Honestly – what kind of quality tech work can you expect from that kind of employee?
Then we have to face the ramifications of all that. We ask every customer to buy every service we offer because our bosses demand that we do it. So, of course, every customer gets angry that we’re badgering them to spend more money. They see us as money hungry employees trying to squeeze every last penny. In reality, we’re just trying to keep our jobs. And when our inexperienced “technician” screws up your computer because the company wouldn’t put out the money for a real tech, the customer service reps have to take the heat from the customer for it.
We’re getting paid like crap to pretend we care while you scream at us for something we didn’t do, had no power to stop, and have very little power to fix.
Customers don’t seem to grasp any of this. The phrase “The customer is always right” seems to have brainwashed people into thinking that they should get their way no matter how absurd their demands are. I read online about a woman who got angry because an employee tried to stop her from cutting ahead of a line of people waiting to have their receipts checked. The employee grabbed the woman’s purse to try to hold her back. Now, I’ll be the first to say that the employee had no right to act the way that he/she did, but at the same time, this lady really thought she was justified in cutting ahead of everyone else who had been waiting because she only had one item and was, as she put it, “in a hurry.” How does that make you more important than other people? The whole thing could’ve been avoided if she hadn’t thought she was better than everyone else.
Then there was the story of the customer who tried to use a taser on a Cheeseburger Champion employee who got their order wrong. How about the woman who called a technical radio show to get help stealing her neighbor’s Wi-Fi connection? People just don’t understand how ridiculous their behavior can be or the hassle we go through in dealing with them, yet they expect us as service people to always be happy and enthusiastic.
You want good service? Here’s the one and only tip you’ll need: You know how you expect us to treat you when you walk into our store or call our company?
Treat us the same way.
I promise you’ll have more good experiences than bad that way. Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of lazy and uncaring employees out there who don’t give a damn whether you’re polite or not. But for the most part, you’ll get a far more pleasant experience with an understanding and friendly attitude than you ever will with anger and threats. Just keep in mind that sometimes, no matter what you do, you won’t be getting your way.
Because the truth is that the customer is not always right.
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I work in tech support for a major cable company, and I have to agree with everything in this post. The most important thing to remember when dealing with customer service is to be nice and patient. If you’re nice to me, I’ll bend over backwards to make you happy. If you start off with a crappy attitude, we’re not going to get anywhere.
I dont care how long you’ve been a customer. We’re not a monopoly (regardless of the fact that people LOVE to tell us that we are).. you have options, try another one.
I can understand that you’re frustrated that your internet isn’t working. i would be pissed off too, but ya know what? Shit happens. I have no control over the fact that a car swerved into a pole and knocked out your cable or internet.. and frankly, cable TV really isn’t that important in the long run, is it?
Cable TV is not your babysitter.. dont ask me what you’re going to do with your kids if the cable isn’t working. I dont care.
If you’re running your business from home, you should have a BUSINESS account with us. We’re not responsbile for money you’re losing because your internet isn’t working. You should’ve shelled out the extra $20 a month to make sure this wouldn’t happen.
If I ask you to do something, do it. It doesn’t matter how much you might think you know about this.. this is what I do 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. I’m not just an idiot with an instruction manual. If you knew that much about it, you wouldn’t be calling me for help.
Frankly, my job kinda sucks. Nice, patient people are few and far between, so the nicer you are to me, but the more I’ll do for you.
Fun Fact: good customer service means helping the customer without pleading to them to assist you in your endeavors. While we would all love for clients to be cooperative and well prepared, this is an unrealistic expectation. If you’re that annoyed by them perhaps it’s time for a work environment with less pressure and constraints you can actually work within…Or maybe you could try a field of work that doesn’t rely on your low threshhold for stupidity?
One item he forgot to mention about the process of escalating a call to a manager.
Very often, the next person to whom you speak will not be a manager, but an employee on the same level as the last one, posing as a manager. They are using the second voice technique to see if they can either get you to calm down or get rid of you.
Not going to say where, but yes, I have seen it done in the workplace.
When you have to call customer service, keep a call log including dates, times, names, and who told you what. It will come in handy for the inevitable Consumerist rant and EECB.
I worked in technical support for AOL, and the way they judged you based on your call time was really ridiculous. It still is ridiculous that companies use it as a way to determine success. At AOL, that was their primary metric. Sure, they would also judge you based on whether the person called back with a problem within a certain amount of time, but that number wasn’t of primary concern to them, only getting them off the phone and reading prompts for “special offers” at the end of the call. I never had my number of followup calls come up as an issue and they only addressed it as a passing remark in training. Basically, they said the only reason they would fire you based on your calls was if you weren’t consistently making the mark with time and not making sales pitches.
At least twice a week, you’d have a sit down with a “buddy” (a supervisor, but they had to use that name because AOL loves buddies) who would listen in on your calls. They had a philosophy that no person ever would have a perfect call, and that they would always find room for improvement. I accept constructive criticism when it is helpful, but basically being told that you will never be good enough can really weigh on a person’s psyche. It was almost like they were trying to keep their employees in a constant state of fear.
Most of the small talk people made was anger at the fact that a large portion of the technical support was based in India. A lot of people couldn’t understand their accents, and that can be frustrating while dealing with a computer problem. At the time I worked there we were basically the “overflow” for India more than the other way around. Of course, eventually they ended up firing everyone in the US and moved everything to India.
I understand everything this guy said, and this guy has every right to say these things. Life stinks at the bottom. Having customers try to bully you gets old fast. Companies try to squeeze things into a box like “get every call done in 4 minutes” and it’s really stressful because people are quite different than that and not every call can fit into that box.
well, no matter what they say i HAVE sued a number of times quite successfully. Small Claims Court or Pro Sea in Civil Court really freaks these guys out. I sued Verizon and they settled before it even went to court; they are afraid of the publicity.
That does actually happen, yes. Sometimes saying, “I’m sorry,” is a queue to customers who are blind with rage that you are somehow directly responsible. I’ve been accused of maliciously withholding internet access more than once just for inching anywhere /near/ an apology. There is also the inevitable customer who is completely offended if you offer any kind of sympathy or condolences for their plight, with or without actually admitting any fault, because you clearly don’t understand them (which brings into question why they’re still on the phone with you, but I digress)…
“You don’t have any idea what it’s like to be in my position!”
Yes, clearly I am a robot who has no emotions and has somehow managed to survive into adulthood while escaping the terror that is the customer service phone queue.
While some call centers do request that CSRs not ascribe any liability to the company they’re working for, others request that “I’m sorry” be removed from one’s repertoire of “key phrases” because you may be apologizing for something prematurely that is not actually your fault, the company’s fault, or anyone’s fault, really.
Sometimes things just happen and you may not know from where you’re sitting that the billing error the client experienced was due to a third-party managing your company’s bank account, or that the customer’s internet service is down because their bunny chewed on some cables after it got loose this afternoon, or that there is a whole department somewhere already dedicated to fixing the problem that they were hoping would never last long enough to inconvenience the customer in the first place.
4. “I have a close relationship with your CEO”
Chances are you do not,
Heh. Years ago, maybe a few years after my dad, my mother was at a local branch of the bank he had been a VP for before he died.There was some sort of problem with the account that the teller wasn’t going to take care of, even though it involved my dad’s pension. My mother, in disgust, said she’ll just call Mr. X when she got home. Mr. X had been my father’s co-worker and was now directly under the bank’s president (who my dad also worked with). As soon as my mother dropped Mr. X’s name, there was a silence and all of the sudden the problem was resolved. And the only reason she mentioned Mr. X and not the CEO was because Mr. X was easier to get a hold of.
Exactly. This is the kind of thing “teeny bopper mentality” CSR’s don’t understand. It’s not just who I know, but it’s who I know that knows the CEO’s neighbor!! My family has been with some institutions / retailers / financiers for over 80 years. I may not have money, but guess what? The rest of my family does and more than once they have pulled ALL of their money out because of the treatment I got and that Mr. or Ms. CSR you can’t see on your screen !!!
I have gone way out of my way for years to address bad behavior with companies, and I still do. I pay my bills on time; early, even, and I expect to get something for it.
As information, #1 this CSR is most likely a CEO or something, I seriously doubt it is a CSR.
#2 I really do either know the CEO or have already looked him up before I call you, if the problem has gotten to the point, it is serious enough for me to waste my time and call you.
#3 If I don’t get resolution, I write every BBB, govt agency AND the CEO, and my attorney and I do really sue. (and I win) Or the company gets fined thousands and thousands of dollars.
Oh did I mention, that if I have time, I also picket the business.
It’s funny the CSR’s like, Jim, if real, never believe I will follow up, but I do. I have 10 years of files saved on just the last 10 years of following up with my legitimate complaints.
And as one poster mentioned, I make sure I tell everybody I see how much XYZ company does not care about their customers and how they try to make you believe that their “policy” is law. BULL – I usually have the USC code or CFR already in my hands, too.
People don’t take corporations “policies” as the gospel. Stand up for your rights.
I used to have this type of attitude when I work Tech support for Gateway Computers. Looks like its time for career change for this CSR. All this animosity and disgruntlement can’t be good for your health.