Phone-line Customer Service Question

[Orrex]

Does this sound familiar?

"All of our associates are busy assisting other callers. To expedite your service, please enter your 16-digit account number."
<<enter digits>>
"Thank you. Please enter your 10-digit phone number, starting with the area code."
<<enter digits>>
"Thank you. Please enter the last for digits of your Social Security Number."
<<enter digits>>
"Thank you. Please hold for the next available representative."

***a lapse of several minutes occurs***

"Thank you for holding. My name is Bob. To expedite your service, could you give me your 16-digit account number?"
<<read off digits>>
"Thanks. And could you give your 10-digit phone number, area code first?"
<<read off digits>>
"Thanks. And could you verify the last four digits of your Social Security Number?"
<<read off digits>>
"Thanks. Please hold for just a moment while I bring up your account information..."

WTF!?! I don't mind entering the numbers on my phone or reading them off to the person on the other end of the line, but why the hell should I have to do both? What is the god damn purpose behind it, except to infuriate me?

:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

[mikeytherat]

1. Answer each of "Bob's" questions with:

"I've already entered the number, as instructed, to expedite this process."

mikey_the_rat

[Orrex]

15. I like to tell Bob that I'm going to dump a bucket of chum in his car, to expedite the process.

Anything I can do to help move things along in an efficient and orderly manner, of course.

[mikeytherat]

20. To have me repeat my account number, say: "Loopins. More bloody loopins" 600 times.

To have me repeat my phone number, hum the first three bars of "Sanctified" by Nine Inch Nails.

To have me confirm my Social Security Numba, please explain the "AMT Refundable Credit Amount" under the Credit for Prior-Year Minimum Tax (with unused minimum tax credit carry-forward from 2003).

Then do the chum thing.

mikey_the_rat

[MrCoffee]

2. That makes me insane too...

I'm mashing buttons like a chimp at the Banana-O-Matic for nothing? Feel my rage, punkass!!!!

[Orrex]

14. It's the same old "how do you keep a DU'er in suspense?"

More about this topic here.

[SacredCow]

3. Reminds me of Circuit City's buy online, pick up at local store scam...

You enter all of the information online to pay for whatever item you're buying, then you print out a receipt. According to the website, you simply go to the store you specified and approach the pick-up counter with the receipt to claim your purchase and be on your merry way. Not so. You stand in line at the pick-up counter, only to be told that you have to go through a cashier line to get a STORE receipt. The cashier also scans your credit card to verify you. Then, you stand in line at the pick up counter AGAIN to FINALLY get your item.

Oh, and then they want to see your receipt on the way out the door.
:hide:

[Orrex]

13. Gaaaahh! Damn the police state!

They can see my receipt if they must, but two lines is one line too many!
:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

[Dr. Strange]

4. I'm sorry, the Forum you posted to is no longer in service.

Please enter your DNA sequence (using 1 for Adenine, 2 for Cytosine, 3 for Guanine, and 4 for Thymine) for further assistance.

[Orrex]

12. Dammit! These antiquated systems never account for Uracil.

I've got RNA too, you know!

[alphafemale]

5. Because the systems are antiquated.

Sometimes they work, but often they don't.

I work as a customer service rep for a VERY major company. The equipment is piteously old.

We actually have to make small talk with customers while their information loads into the system. A process that generally takes up to two minutes. When-it-loads-at-all.

But most people are so happy to be speaking to an American that they don't seem to mind.

The place I work is closing next week.

Not to worry, I have another job starting the following week.

[Orrex]

11. That's certainly very true, because an expensive upgrade would compromise the CEO's bonus

At one former employer (a major company with significant international dealings), the primary data entry system predated Windows V1.0.

Not only did it lack any of the modern conventions for key-strokes or movement around the screen, it wasn't even in ternally consistent from one screen to the next. Sometimes F4 takes you to the top of the screen, sometimes it dumps you back to the first screen, and sometimes it logs you out. In essence, you had to memorize a different keyboard map for each of the 30+ screens you might use in the course of a session.

Brilliant!

[alphafemale]

6. Oh and by the way. Just hit the # key when asked to enter a number.

You'll eventually get the operator you were going to be transferred to anyway.

[Orrex]

10. I find that if I scream and bang the receiver on a table, that works too.

With the added benefit of providing a much-needed catharsis.

[From The Ashes]

7. I understand your frustration, sir.

speaking as a customer service rep, we are required to verify your info. And yes, I know it's stupid. We have software that populates your info automatically. We still have to ask. :shrug:

[BelleCarolinaPeridot]

8. I understand.

It could happen that you end up not being connected to the person whose info you are seeing on the screen.

I had a customer service rep spend 15 minutes on the phone getting me the right information on my car insurance. I asked to be connected to her supervisor so that her manager knows much I appreciated her help.

[Orrex]

9. CSR here, too

My point is that it's stupid to have to give the information twice. I understand the need to confirm that the person on the line is the same person who's authorized to discuss the account, but in that case there's no point in having the caller punch in the data for the automated system.

It's impossible to go through that without feeling as though they were just giving you something to do while all their associates were "busy assisting other customers."

I can also understand how it's possible to have to enter the data in order to use the automated system (to check balances or other stuff the caller can do on her own) and then have to re-verify the info to a CSR, but in that case the system should say "Please hold for the next available representative. For your security we may ask you to verify certain information again." That way the person is in the loop and doesn't feel like she's getting the runaround.

[hvn_nbr_2]

16. The first time you enter the data is for the NSA

If you're on the not-friends-of-George list, then you go on indefinite hold till a TSA SWAT team shows up at your house to photo-X-ray your genitals and take your bottled water.

If you pass the NSA test, then they connect you to the CSR; but since no data is allowed out of NSA, they can't pass the data on to the CSR and you have to tell the CSR your info again.

[Orrex]

17. That's the most sensible explanation I've ever read

But couldn't they x-ray my bottled water, instead?

[hvn_nbr_2]

18. Only if your genitals are explosive and your bottled water is titillating. nt

[REP]

19. When I worked in Hell

The first time you entered your number, you got routed to the 'right' center (sometimes), but it didn't pass the information you entered on to the CSR. We hated it too.