Customer care hell...

willmunny1990

How do you treat customer care agents when you ring in with a problem?

Say if you have a problem with Sky, UPC or Eircom etc..

I will admit i was harsh on the phone a few times to people until i experienced the job myself. I personally will never act the cnut to anyone ever again if i have a problem because 9 times out of 10 the poor bastard on the phone cant do anything, plus his hands are most likely tied due to company policy.

People always grow balls when they are on the phone, they no your hands are tied and you have to be polite and respectful on the phone to them, its bull****. I used never mind the abuse i got, what was worse is getting some condescending arsehole who thinks he knows it all and treats you like a child.

The never ending sop stories are also bad. I have to say i am just not cut out for Customer Care. The money you earn just isn't enough to warrant the abuse and hell the job is.

How do you feel about working in Customer care?

Plus how do you treat them when your on the phone?

Agricola

Always treat them nicely. Ive been in their shoes and its no picnic. If they try to be helpful and cordial then I do the same.

TanG411

I never worked in customer care, but still treat them nicely. It shouldn't take someone who has already been in their shoes to realise what a difficult job it is.

Ghandee

I honest to God speak to members of staff, be it C/C or people on the tills as I would like to be spoken to/treated myself.

Good manners cost nothing, and I find that Sugar works better than vinegar when trying to get a problem dealt with to my satisfaction.

wardy2

if your nice to customer care people on the phone ,the more they help you.

TeddyTedson

I'm always as polite as possible to them. They're just doing their job and it's nice to be nice to people.
My friend worked in a one and said the amount of people that ring up shouting at him was really high. I can't believe so many people lost in on the phone, chill the **** out.

HOS 1997

wardy2 wrote: »

if your nice to customer care people on the phone ,the more they help you.

That isn't always true unfortunately.

I've worked in that area for a number of areas and it's generally the customers who complain the most get their way (sad but true).

peckerhead

Oldie but goodie...
http://youtu.be/Yj2oXMdZ4sk

DarkJager

I was about 6 years in various customer care/technical support roles (never again ). In my first job, I got a real prick on the phone one day calling me all sorts and having a good old rant. As I hadn't been trained on the "3 strike rule", I told him I'd personally call to his house and he could repeat everything to my fist. Fired the same day but something I always remembered in later jobs when listening to them.

The thing is, screaming gets you nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. No matter how bad the problem is, the guy on the other end is just there to help and is most certainly not paid enough to get hearing damage. Also it makes you sound mentally unstable and you'll become the topic of many a laugh on smoke breaks

Anyone I ever talked to that spoke to me in a reasonable adult manner got far much more help than the screaming twat. If you are one of these idiots, I suggest you work one week in a call centre and you will never act that way again on a phone.

Depends on how they treat me. I'm usually very polite when on the phone to customer services. Have dealt with the ESB, Vodafone, O2, Meteor, Flo-gas and several others without any issue at all.

A big exception was UPC. A few years ago I had a problem where I knew exactly what the problem was. I called to explain and got a very rude Limerick man on the other end, denying that my modem was at fault and constantly cut across me while I was talking. I was fit to snap but he eventually gave in and agreed to get the modem replaced just to shut me up. Turned out I was right too.

Oh, and Microsoft once drove me mental too. That was the only time I ever roared down the phone at someone.

Seachmall

You learn to deal with them.

I'm a programmer so I try to have as little contact with people as possible but due to where I work I occassionaly have to take phones.

I have learned many things working the phones but one thing sticks out more than anything else: People are assholes.

I have a theory called the Black Box Theory, derived from the science and engineering model, that because people don't know nor care how the inner runnings of the business work they assume you are capable of meeting their demands and expect everything to run smoothly despite the fact you operate in the real world where unavoidable things occur.

They reject your statements of things occurring that are outside of your control such as deliveries not arriving or arriving damaged or people getting sick etc. because those are issues within the business. Their interface with the business is supposed to hide that from their view and they simply don't care. As a result they get angry and frustrated when they realise they cannot have their demands met and, as per Black Box Theory, they take it out on the guy on the phone who, ironically, is the one with the least amount of power within the business.

Fortunately with experience you learn how to deal with these people. Spend two months and you'll learn how to tell them what they want to hear. You know and they know what you say makes no difference to what they want to get done but ultimately they just want you to listen to them and give them positive feedback.

If I ever hear my friends give out **** to someone on the phone I will, without exception, slap them full force across the face. That's not hyperbole either. I've had people make my day hell because they've nothing better to do than scream down a phone and I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

When it comes to how things work people are wilfully ignorant and, worst of all, they use that ignorance to justify making someone's job the worst job in the world.

Fuck. Those. People.

whatdoicare

I'm always as clear and polite as I can be - worked in a call centre a few years ago and it was just awful!
I also find that if you are clear and polite that everything gets done quicker and everyone is happy.

I have once lost the rag with someone in a call centre - my laptop was broken, I was 100% entitled to a replacement and the girl on the other end was having none of it - I realised that the reason she was holding off was that the guarantee was up in a month (Xmas was in the middle of the month) and she wanted me to extend it - whereas I would have gotten a new guarantee with the new laptop (this was part of the original deal when I purchased the laptop)

It was costing me a fortune ringing her and her story changed to having no guarantee to blaming me for the fault to trying to send me a new charger to just hanging up on me several times when I tried to read out the terms and conditions on my guarantee. I eventually just lost it and started demanding her supervisor. She flat out refused this and I went nuts. She hung up on me again and I left it at that.

I went into the shop where I bought the laptop - told them what had happened and explained that I just couldn't afford another phone call to the call centre. The lady in the shop got straight onto them for me - yelled blue murder at them (I mean it when I say blue murder - there was a fair amount of cursing) and I went home that day with my new laptop and guarantee. Success!:) I sent that lady a thank you card straight away

Big Nasty

I always try to be as polite as possible but on more than one occasion I've been completely frustrated by them and have lost the head.

To be fair much of the frustration can occur while being on hold for 27.8 minutes before your call is taken.

starbelgrade

Generally have no problem with them, but trained monkeys would be better than the help you get from customer care from PTSB. I honestly believe that they employ the dumbest fuckwits they can find who are able to answer a telephone without eating it or setting fire to themselves.

Professey Chin

Always try and be polite & civil to them after working in 1 myself before.
The only time I got annoyed was Vodafone. They cut my service cause I apparently hadnt paid my bill(I did) and when I rang them up the fella on the phone said he could see the payment on my account but wouldnt unblock it until I sent a fax proving id paid it -_-

Seachmall

MCMLXXV wrote: »

I always try to be as polite as possible but on more than one occasion I've been completely frustrated by them and have lost the head.

To be fair much of the frustration can occur while being on hold for 27.8 minutes before your call is taken.

But the person you're talking to has no control over that. They're just there trying to make a wage in what is genuinely a supremely shitty job. They're not responsible for why the company did you wrong or why you were on hold for 30 minutes and if he says he can't sort the issue he cannot sort the issue, if he could he'd do it ASAP because the longer it takes the more likely it is you'll get aggravated.

The guy on the phone doesn't really care about your problems and he'll care even less if you lose the plot with him. If you want to flip out at someone ask for the manager, at least he actually has the discretion to sort out your problem.

up for anything

Seachmall wrote: »

If I ever hear my friends give out **** to someone on the phone I will, without exception, slap them full force across the face. That's not hyperbole either.

That's a bit strange - apply physical force to make people speak nicely on the phone. I can't see how it works because if you were my friend and slapped me full force across the face you'd never see/hear me on the phone again unless it was on one of those prison visiting phones with you on the inside.

cocoshovel

polite and concise. I also research a bit on my problem too as I usually try fix it myself. Those things combined make for extremely fast and effective problem solving and we usually get along great. (as we understand the problems and can get down to fixing them fast)

Have had nothing but good experiences with Eircom, A.I.B and PayPal american call centre so far.

Alot of people get all angry and frustrated in turn creating problems for themselves, making the original problem harder to solve....and they're idiots.

fro9etb8j5qsl2

I worked for UPC back in the good old NTL changeover days and the horrific abuse never really bothered me. I always try to be nice when I speak to customer service but it does drive me insane when the person on the other end of the line can't string a sentence of english together :mad::mad: Also, I did become fairly irate with a 3 customer service agent who was trying to convince me in the most condescending manner that 0.8mbps was an excellent internet speed when I was paying for 7mbps :mad:

Seachmall

up for anything wrote: »

That's a bit strange - apply physical force to make people speak nicely on the phone. I can't see how it works because if you were my friend and slapped me full force across the face you'd never see/hear me on the phone again unless it was on one of those prison visiting phones with you on the inside.

Friend or not if you put someone in that position I'll slap you.

And I've that kind of relationship with my friends, my best friend once decked me a few years ago over something stupid. He bought me a pint and we laughed it off. Good times.

krudler

MCMLXXV wrote: »

I always try to be as polite as possible but on more than one occasion I've been completely frustrated by them and have lost the head.

To be fair much of the frustration can occur while being on hold for 27.8 minutes before your call is taken.

dont blame the call centre for that, blame the ****wits who ring in constantly with trivial stupid queries that a 10 second google could answer who make the queues longer wasting the agents time, its not like people who work in customer are sitting there tiwddling their thumbs answering the phone when they feel like it, you get no time between calls, like none, one ends another one comes through straight away, you can take yourself out of the queue but then you impact everyone else.

I work in a call centre, its where you see, or rather hear, the general public at its very worst, people dont seem to understand that screaming at agents gets you nowhere, at all, it'll get you put on hold to calm down ("I'll just go talk to a supervisor" really I'm just sitting there or gone to make coffee and hope you hang up) or just hung up on if you get abusive.

I could, and probably should, write a book about working in a call centre, its hilarious and horrifying at the same time.

fusuf

I'm always polite with them and have never worked in a call centre. I dont understand how it could take people experiencing the job first hand to realise that being a rude prick gets you nowhere. I don't agree with the argument that being a c*nt will get you the help you need. Being polite is not the same as letting them brush you off when you claim you deserve a better service, I'd imagine they are trained to do this. But cursing and shouting is completely pointless and unnecessary even if you know you are in the right.

IsaMtq

Worked in a call centre years ago, one of my first jobs & it was mind-numbingly tedious, got my fair share of rude arrogant customers on the phone & usually dealt with it with general ambivalence. One day had just had enough & turned the rude arrogance back on some fecker on the phone and took the head off him. Was v. pleased with myself upon hanging up….. till I was called into the office & whole thing played back to me. When they say they record all calls, yea they really do!

Pdfile

starbelgrade wrote: »

Generally have no problem with them, but trained monkeys would be better than the help you get from customer care from PTSB. I honestly believe that they employ the dumbest fuckwits they can find who are able to answer a telephone without eating it or setting fire to themselves.

in fairness though, alot of the call staff i get are normally ex FAS/mentally challenged due to them getting the job through key hole scheme...

not to put them down or anything, But a jobs a job... its not a hard one... Everyone just expects it done right i guess.

up for anything

Seachmall wrote: »

Friend or not if you put someone in that position I'll slap you.

And I've that kind of relationship with my friends, my best friend once decked me a few years ago over something stupid. He bought me a pint and we laughed it off. Good times.

So what do you do when you find me in tears on the phone trying to get some satisfaction from a customer service agent who is parroting the party line and refuses to let me speak to a supervisor?

IsaMtq

5 Idiotic Misconceptions About Calling Customer Service:

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-idiotic-misconceptions-about-calling-customer-service/

Seachmall

up for anything wrote: »

So what do you do when you find me in tears on the phone trying to get some satisfaction from a customer service agent who is parroting the party line and refuses to let me speak to a supervisor?

Oh well clearly I smack you because "context" does not exist in my world.

KittyeeTrix

I would be very appreciative and aware of the general idiots these call centre workers have to put up with on a hourly basis and would be above nice to them on the phone until one day I had to deal with one particular landline phone company...

Lets just say it ended with me fuming, still don't know how it happened but it was the most frustrating thing in the world to deal with as she spouted one generic response after another to me. I could have strangled her with my bare hands at that moment:mad::(

Like I said I'm mild mannered on the phone so I could only imagine the type of effect this particular call centre worker would have on someone less mild mannered!!

smash

I like to phone customer care lines and play sound clips of bricktop from snatch, then hang up!

cloud493

I try to be as nice as possible to customers. A smile costs nothing, and most people appreciate it. Even if I'm having a bad day, or the customer is a scumbag who is trying to rip me off/being a dick, I'm always polite. If your polite, they can't say anything against you essentially. If you're rude, you're just giving them ammunition to use against you :rolleyes:

subway

i dont ring them anymore, i just ring a mate and ask them to read the faq on the website to me. it gives the same result and no hold times.

booboo88

MCMLXXV wrote: »

I always try to be as polite as possible but on more than one occasion I've been completely frustrated by them and have lost the head.

To be fair much of the frustration can occur while being on hold for 27.8 minutes before your call is taken.

As much as it wrecks my head, it cant be helped, I did lose it by email with boots customer care as I held for 42minutes, using up all my credit and no one bothered to pick up the phone, I went into boots store and they were able to get onto them straight away, its a bit ridiculous.

But I work in a call centre and its mind numbing work, people ring up with moronic questions and then complain about the lenght of time it takes to get through....what you cant say to them is that the reason it took so long is your not the only muppet to ring with a stupid question.



But you get more crap from team leaders in the call centre, like monitoring your bathroom breaks, you cant scratch without someone knowing

_blank_

UPC are ****.

That is all.

Mr. Manager

I'm in the middle of trying to sort an issue with a mobile phone provider and their customer service is one of the worst I've ever come across.

Not going to bother going into detail about what the scenario is but my patience has been pushed to the limit with these people and as such my manner has slid ever since I received a reply.

Needless to say, profanity gets you now where.

Tipsy McSwagger

I'm polite but can get a bit agitated if they won't do their best to solve my problem. A while back I had a problem with my router and the lady was no help at all, in fact she was a snotty cow. She ended up making me angry. I rang back the next day, got a nice chap and told him to cancel the broadband, he arranged to send out a technician and I thanked him and told him that's all I wanted in the first place.

_feedback_

Have worked in a customer care job myself, and know that a person who is nice to you will get help quicker.

I am always nice and polite when calling these days.

Have to say though, I did get a bit annoyed recently, after spending FOUR MONTHS trying to sort something very simple with UPC. Their customer service is horrendous.

_blank_

elviscostello wrote: »

Have to say though, I did get a bit annoyed recently, after spending FOUR MONTHS trying to sort something very simple with UPC. Their customer service is horrendous.

Their policy in training (and I know this, because I've been through their training) is to tell lies to the customer, fob them off at every opportunity, invent policies that frustrate the customer, promise call back times that they know won't happen, promise technical call outs that they know won't happen and not compensate customers for lost earnings, be extremely rude to customers. Basically, anything that gets the customers off the phone is game ball. No-one has any accountability, and they certainly don't "care" about their customers.

All they do care about is their bottom line. Get the money off the customers, and then tell them to fúck off.

Vicxas

I work in customer support and i never lose my rag with other people as the job is very tough when you're bound to ridiculous policies sometimes.

Nothingbetter2d

having worked tech support in a call centre before i perfectly understand how some customers can be over the top at times. noone one tech support can know absolutely everything about what they are supporting....

there are times when you are stumped as to the problem... but thats the time you know you should escalate it to the next tier of support... i find alot of tier 1 tech support guys fail to realise this and try to solve it themselves but at the same time drag out the problem which frustrates the customer.

but the biggest gripe customers tend to have is the minefield of options you have to go through and the amount of times you have to repeat the same information over n over to a computerised call handler or human reception before you get to speak to an actual tech support agent.

call centres need to try reduce the amount of times a customer has to repeat themselves in order to reduce the aggressiveness of customers towards tech support agents.

this is the main reason why call centres have huge staff turnover rates, because its very stressfull having to deal with irate customers all the time especially when your being paid peanuts.

Seachmall

Nothingbetter2d wrote: »

this is the main reason why call centres have huge staff turnover rates, because its very stressfull having to deal with irate customers all the time especially when your being paid peanuts.

This is another reason why you shouldn't lose the plot with customer care.

Customer Care starts with two types of people

1. People who genuinely care about your problem
2. People who don't care about your problem

Now the people who do care about your problem tend to get very upset when somebody spends 10 minutes cursing them out of it. These people don't last very long in customer support.

The other people, the ones who don't care about your problem, last much longer because they have the ability to distance themselves from you and your problem. These people will be helpful as long as you remain calm but once you start freaking out they've lost all interest.

Ultimately customer care fills up with the second type of people because the first type can't hack it or turn into the second type in order to maintain their sanity.



If you lose your temper with customer care not only do you become an asshole who's screaming at a minimum wage employee who's name you don't even know but you hinder any chance of actually sorting out your problem.

Once you begin getting frustrated either ask to speak to a different call center worker who might be more experienced and be able to help you better or ask to speak to the manager who has the discretion to solve your problem those who work the phones don't.

token101

Having worked in this kind of job, I'll say this. If someone comes on the phone asking for something and they are nice, polite and respectful, you'll go out of your way for them. I stayed over half an hour at work once just to help someone I'd never met because they were so nice, despite her being totally f***ed around.

And then there's the flip side. I don't actually mind someone ringing up and shouting for a minute or two, but then upon realising they're being a dick, calming down and usually apologising. But, when you get the few who ring up, and attack you personally, that's when you have the fun with them. After calling me a useless bastard for mispronouncing her Irish name, one absolute **** then proceeeded to say: 'At least you're not one of them Indians' (she didn't say Indians, she used a racial slur that I'm not going to put). I 'just popped her on hold for a moment'. I went to lunch whilst she cracked up listening to worst hold music ever. She called back to complain, boss just listened to the call and said that putting people on hold for 40 minutes was 'not best practice and to avoid this'.

SEPT 23 1989

Vodafone:mad:

Standard Toaster

If you want to get satisfaction you best remain nice and polite.
Someone roaring down the phone is the last person that will be helped.

I will say, Sky are a bunch of %*&£$ though.

bigneacy

willmunny1990 wrote: »

How do you treat customer care agents when you ring in with a problem?

Plus how do you treat them when your on the phone?

With utter contempt. I know i am a better person than them so why shouldn't i?

willmunny1990

Des wrote: »

UPC are ****.

That is all.

Maybe they are. That doesn't mean the guy on the phone trying to help you is. If someone has a serious problem they should insist on a manager IMO as the issue probably goes over the agents head.

Old people are the worst, can't do checks, can't hear you and they all feel like the world owes the something. They always have very odd demands and are stubborn as fcuk. Idiots really.

willmunny1990

bigneacy wrote: »

With utter contempt. I know i am a better person than them so why shouldn't i?

Wouldn't mind writing your name and address down when it pops up on screen then go pay you a little visit. I'd say your balls would shrink then;)

krudler

subway wrote: »

i dont ring them anymore, i just ring a mate and ask them to read the faq on the website to me. it gives the same result and no hold times.

about 90% of the calls I deal with can be avoided if people werent stupid and lazy, seriously google answers most of the things people ring in about, or the manual that the phone came with, its just people are lazy and cant be arsed to look. its either on google, the phone makers website or our own, these are the same people who complain it took us 10 minutes to answer when all they want to know is how to turn on their phone (yes I get asked that regularly "i turned off my phone and cant turn it back on how do I do it" errr, the same button you pushed to turn it off?)

krudler

willmunny1990 wrote: »

Wouldn't mind writing your name and address down when it pops up on screen then go pay you a little visit. I'd say your balls would shrink then;)

customer care agents could ruin your life if they felt like it

mikemac1

wardy2 wrote: »

if your nice to customer care people on the phone ,the more they help you.

Truest words on the thread

Treat them as you would like to be treated and they'll do their very best for you

I've heard horror stories about UPC but I've always found the lads and ladies in the East Point call centre to be superb at their jobs and they'll do anything they can to fix the issue

The best customers are those who have worked a few ****ty low paid jobs in their time, it's tough
Thew worst are well to do "oh did you need a degree to get your job" sneering types. Forgetting that lots in the call centre are probably better educated then then they are

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

krudler wrote: »

customer care agents could ruin your life if they felt like it

Then don't make them feel like it!

Been there, done that. Be a wanker and you will receive wankery customer services and. Don't know about ruining someone's life, I mean, I don't want to actually murder his family or anything.

Most people who act the bollix tend to forget that they're actually dealing with a human being who actually might like to be helpful. Believe it or not, while he may work for Vodafone/3/Sky/UPC/11850/whoever, but that does not mean he actually swears blind allegiance to the company ethos!

ash23

I just hate when you answer a question and because the person doesn't like the answer they rant and rave. And when you repeat the answer they still don't listen. And when you show them that you are correct and they will not get x,y or z they still rant. And when you maintain your stance showing them that they are not getting what they think they should get, they give out to you for repeating yourself or for not being helpful.

For example.

"Why wasn't I covered for that?"
"Well Sir, as you can see in the literature, it does clearly state that item is not covered"
"20 min rant with cursing and ranting"
"I am sorry you feel that way Sir but unfortunately, as it states, there is no cover for that item"
Cue more rants, more of me saying the same thing in a different way and then them going
"You are the most unhelpful person I have ever come across. This is atrocious customer service and I want to make a complaint".

Basically if you don't jump and tell them that you will of course ignore the rules and pay them right away, then you are useless and ignorant and unhelpful.

And this might be a generalisation but I find teachers are the most condescending people to deal with over the phone.
I am not 5 and I am not your student. I actually do know more about my job than you do so take the patronising tone out of your voice and speak to me like a normal person thank you.
:mad: