Put on Hold by Telephone Call Centers

That would require more intelligence than the average customer service person possesses.

They probably have just enough agents to handle incoming calls. Then there's the issue of paying someone for "non-productive" time dialing and waiting for you to answer.

What makes me want to kill is the "Listen carefully because our menu has just changed" announcment that you are forced to listen to each time you are waiting for a human. "Just changed" means two years ago.

I suspect that in many cases the "changed" message is the initial IVR recording. There is no need to remember to change it later if you already say "changed" message is being played.

Funny that the robot telly-marketing centers never have any problem calling me.

Not just calling you but when you answer your phone, they immediately put you on hold.

Do as I do hit the button which ever they say it is for account receivable. No organization wants to miss being paid something. Then think of some lame excuse that makes them fell bad with out being nasty to whom ever answered. Usually works every time. You get transfered to real person that can help you.

Not with government agencies. They just don"t give a $hit.

Or maybe because that is what they do so they are hip to that maneuver.

Yea, Government agencies don't care, they aren't doing anything productive anyway.

Why ... can't I just leave my telephone number and the "next available agent" call me bacK...?

When I had to deal with the Social Security folks after my wife passed away, that's exactly what they did. I'd leave my number and they'd call me back.

Ordinarily, though, when I have to deal with such things I use a speaker phone, so I can continue working (or doing whatever), and I set the phone next to me. When I hear the connection ringing, I know an operator/agent is about to handle my call.

That would require time to go through those messages and doing call backs. Some places do but if the call ins are in high volume and it is you that needs them, it is better to just hold or call them when they first open up.

Some of these actually work:

http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/sectionfront/life/web-sites-help-you-get-through-phone-trees-to-real-people-501292/

Newegg let's you do that. I figure it's only a matter of time til other people do as well. Then again, when was the last time an agency (let's say the Post Office) did anything innovative? I usually just put the phone on speaker and do something else while I wait.

I had cause to contact our telephone ombudsman's office recently.

After going through all of the "voice recognition" crap which didn't understand a word I said, I was eventually informed by yet another automated voice that I was now in a "priority queue" whatever that means.

I put the phone down and went about my work for the next approximately 2 hours while a recorded voice came on every so often to happily inform me that I had progressed in the queue.

All of a sudden, another message came on to tell me the office hours of the establishment, and that as I was calling outside of those office hours, I would need to call back tomorrow.

It then cut me off.

I was ringing said Ombudsman to complain about my telco's lack of service

I didn't bother to call back.

They don't want to deal with people's complaints so they insulate themselves from it. They do what they please and make it so people just give up trying to deal with the problems they created.

Unfortunately this (scrolling) page is not long enough to take my hobby horse.

First, it is illegal (UK) to put someone on hold if the call is to a premium rate number.
Not many callers know this, and they get away with it, since very few complain.

Second, it arrogantly rude to put someone on hold, and even more so to then blast
their hearing ability with violently loud discordant music. (however much "they" like it)

I really struggle to understand, let alone like, any company that force me (and
others) to accept this practice. I hang up, and/or give my custom to someone else.
Surely they could see, especially when calling a premium number, how annoying it is?

It doesn't stop there. Visit the local post office (and other establishments) where again,
one is obliged to wait in a queue because... they are saving on counter staff.
The local PO regularly has a queue of > 20+ people waiting to be checked out.

For a checkout lasting e.g. 4 minutes per person, the average waiting time is > 40 minutes.
Multiple this by 20 people for most of the day, 20 x 40 x 8hours = 6,400 min. approx.
106 man/woman hours lost! Giving them the benefit of the 6 hours, as a group of customers,
we still lose 100 hours EVERY DAY! Courtesy of the PO. (& others)

They have reduced their wage bill, by using a few less counter staff, all completely
at our expense. (loss) I wonder if their managers would like to be kept waiting in a
queue for > 40 minutes, so that I can reduce my wage bill? Is this reasonable?

In my opinion this is unreasonable; and unfair, as our time is equally important to us.
Again this is forced upon us because, if we vote with our feet and use a different store,
they aggravate the position by then further reducing their staff, to suit the now fewer
waiting customers!

Simply, I try not to use these points of contact (phone/store) at all, if possible.
I would urge everyone to complain, and/or vote with their feet on these systems.

Sorry for the rant, but as you can see, it is a hobby horse for me. (time is precious.)

jt.

A man goes to the doctor and says. "Doctor, I can't pronounce my F's T's or H's?"

Well, says the doctor. "You can't say fairer than that."

Good Points.

It seems to me that places that are the biggest offenders are when you call someone that has already provided you with a good or service that you have a problem with and want to get it resolved. On their end, having to resolve a problem equates to rework so they make it difficult for you to get matters taken care of and many people end up just giving up and living with the faulty product or service given.

C'mon JT don't bottle it up..Get it off your chest...Let it all out

You forgot the supermarkets where they have 20 checkouts, only 2 open, and a queue a mile long.

Seriously though, by far the largest perpetrators of these indignities are the government institutions and utilities where you have no choice but to deal with them, at least you can go to another supermarket and wait in their queue.

Hi bwilco, that's why I say "and others"

It's all contention. How they can save money (staffing) while keeping the
customers waiting, on the phone or in a queue.

No one wants idle staff, but.. I would suggest that in quiet times they can find
them something else to do? e.g. stacking shelves, whatever.
Then, place them on the checkout immediately there is more than 2 waiting.

This is where the cost savings come in - let 5 wait! 10 wait! 20 customers wait!

Grrrrr... you say let it all out! However.... how about we could have a stand off !

All the customers could stand still - and leave the tellers doing nothing!

Make a good comedy sketch, and maybe get the point across, that we are losing time

while now, the stores are losing money, who cracks first! Ahh well, dream on..

jt.

A female BBC journalist heard about a very old Jewish man who had been going
to the Wailing Wall to pray, twice a day, every day, for a long, long time.

So she went to check it out. She went to the Wailing Wall and there he was,
walking slowly up to the holy site.

She watched him pray and after about 45 minutes, when he turned to leave,
using a cane and moving very slowly, she approached him for an interview.

"Pardon me, sir, I'm from the BBC. What's your name?"

"Morris Fishbien," he replied.

"Sir, how long have you been coming to the Wailing Wall and praying?"

"For about 60 years."

"60 years! That's amazing! What do you pray for?"

"I pray for peace between the Christians, Jews and the Muslims.
I pray for all the wars and all the hatred to stop.
I pray for all our children to grow up safely as responsible adults, and
to love their fellow man."

"How do you feel after doing this for 60 years?"

"Like I'm talking to a bloody brick wall."

As mentioned earlier, there are ways to avoid the que... sometimes!

www.gethuman.com has some viable ways.

If they don't have a solution, I just start spamming the "0" key and hope. If that doesn't work I'll just start punching buttons at random. If nothing else I hope to crash their system. I've managed that once or twice.

Then, when and if I get a human, I immediately demand to speak to a decision making supervisor. I'm not wasting my time with underlings any more.

Unfortunately, sometimes you get someone who's been trained to put you on hold until the line drops.

Hooker

I put the phone on speaker and then set it down so I can do other things while I wait. That is okay for me. My cable company has a function where you can leave a message and they call you back. I used it once. It worked.

Here I am again. I had to call my bank's Customer service number today. They must have read my original post. Lo and behold, they just installed the exact type of call back service that I was asking about. They have just insured that I will be a customer for life.

Funny voice response.

http://www.maxusability.com/test/Psychiatric_Office_Answering_Machine.mp3