Unfiltered Story #116468

I was working tech support for a major desktop computer chain. One of our other phone centers was down, so we were getting twice the normal volume. The ticker on the wall reached over 150 calls in the queue, with a wait time over 45 minutes. The customers weren’t very happy, but most of the time they were happy to get their issues resolved fast so that we could go on to other calls. But then this one came in…

Me: Thank you for calling [Company] Tech Support, how may I help you today?

Caller: OH MY GOD! I have been on hold for over thirty minutes! How can you conduct business like this?? I am so upset that I had to wait for this long!!

(She continues to go on to complain about the long wait time for literally ten minutes before I’m finally able to get her calmed down)

Me: I apologize for the wait, but I’m here now and I’ll do everything I can to help you. What is it you’re calling about?

Caller: It says “Click Next to Continue.” What am I supposed to do?

Me: Um….. Click … Next …?

Caller: Ok, thank you.

(I was too dumb-struck to hang up after that, but it turned out that she was in the middle of reinstalling Windows from a previous call, who had hung up for the hour-long file copy to complete, just like we’re supposed to. I had to stay on with her for almost an hour to get all the drivers installed, but I was flabbergasted that someone had to call in just to be told to click Next, when it was literally the only thing they could have done!)