We’re guilty of spreading disinformation; Sprint’s $3, seven-minute rule is the average customer service reps shoot for, over time. It’s not per call, as we’ve been trumpeting (out our ass, it seems) in our headlines. Kevin writes:

Basically it’s averages, not each specific call; their goal is to average a $3 credit per call and to have an average call time of 7 minutes. Now that doesn’t sound like a lot but for every person that calls up with a big billing problem that needs a $200 credit and is on the phone for 45 minutes you can get 20 or 30 calls of people just checking how many minutes they have left, want to know their account balance or change an address. All of those are quick, and don’t require credits. Policies like these are in use at call-centers for just about every company and are certainly no excuse for denying a customer the time or money needed to rectify a problem.

That certainly makes a lot more sense, and sounds less sinister, despite our pictures of Ebeneezer Scrooge and Soviet anti-capitalist posters. Consumerist, stop railing the Kooll-Aid! It’s metrics, not evil… but wait, their customer service still sucks. Oh yeah, right. Bring back that puppy, we’re not done kicking it. — BEN POPKEN

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