Tuesday, November 09, 2004
Paid To Smile
17.17 Eight Minutes Late
Somedays, by five o'clock I'm so brain dead I can barely be bothered to unplug from the headset and go home. This was one of those days. We're down two staff members who are not going to be replaced any time soon, and today we had to handle all the backlogged calls that had stacked up as a result of yesterday's fabulous office-closing "Communication Event".
So, some "Etiquette For Service Users".
It seems appropriate at this time to mention some of the things not to say to the person who answers the phone when you are making a call to a 'free at point of use' service and are anticipating getting some help from them :
"Are you a machine?"
"Are you human?"
"Oh, you've finished your tea break then?"
Because, just to re-cap you are anticipating getting some help from them. They didn't want that previous caller to have been on the line for twenty-five minutes, believe me. It was doing their call stats no good at all, but, and here's the thing, some calls just take that long to deal with. If you'd like a shorter wait we can cut you after after you've had your four minutes and you can join the queue again? Is that better?
And I know, I'm paid to be polite, however much you try to piss me off. I'm just not very good at it.
End of rant.
PS You Rock My World - Eels
Pounding - Doves
Girls & Boys - Good Charlotte
Babylon's Burning - the Ruts
Funeral Pyre - The Jam
Promises - The Buzzcocks
Whole Wide World - Wreckless Eric
Another Girl Another Planet - The Only Ones
Teenage Kicks - The Undertones
Somedays, by five o'clock I'm so brain dead I can barely be bothered to unplug from the headset and go home. This was one of those days. We're down two staff members who are not going to be replaced any time soon, and today we had to handle all the backlogged calls that had stacked up as a result of yesterday's fabulous office-closing "Communication Event".
So, some "Etiquette For Service Users".
It seems appropriate at this time to mention some of the things not to say to the person who answers the phone when you are making a call to a 'free at point of use' service and are anticipating getting some help from them :
"Are you a machine?"
"Are you human?"
"Oh, you've finished your tea break then?"
Because, just to re-cap you are anticipating getting some help from them. They didn't want that previous caller to have been on the line for twenty-five minutes, believe me. It was doing their call stats no good at all, but, and here's the thing, some calls just take that long to deal with. If you'd like a shorter wait we can cut you after after you've had your four minutes and you can join the queue again? Is that better?
And I know, I'm paid to be polite, however much you try to piss me off. I'm just not very good at it.
End of rant.
PS You Rock My World - Eels
Pounding - Doves
Girls & Boys - Good Charlotte
Babylon's Burning - the Ruts
Funeral Pyre - The Jam
Promises - The Buzzcocks
Whole Wide World - Wreckless Eric
Another Girl Another Planet - The Only Ones
Teenage Kicks - The Undertones
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