Not Exactly Crystal Clear

I work IT for a bank. My name is comparatively common, with a couple of different similar-sounding variations. I’m fairly used to people almost never calling me by my actual name but one of the variations because they hear it just right/wrong through the phone.

I’m on the phone with a user and they’ve had to set the phone down for some reason. They’ve come back to the phone but aren’t quite speaking fully into the mouthpiece.

User: “Okay, Crystal, I’m back.”

Crystal is nowhere close to my name, other than they start with the same letter, so I think they are possibly talking to another teller and don’t respond. The user shifts the phone and starts panicking.

User: “Crystal! Crystal, are you there? You shouldn’t have hung up on me! Oh, tell me she didn’t hang up on me!”

As they get ready to launch into full-fledged panic mode, I clue in that they’re talking to me. Admittedly, I probably should have picked up on it sooner but I am still new enough that getting called a name that is nothing like my actual name is still surprising.

Me: “Oh, sorry! I didn’t realize that you were talking to me.”

User: “I said your name several times!”

Me: “Um… you didn’t. I thought you might have been talking to a customer.”

Bear in mind, I answered the call with, “[Bank], this is [My Name],” and they said “Hi, [My Name], I’m having this issue.”

User: “Yes, I did! You shouldn’t lie to me, Crystal!”

Me: “My name’s not Crystal.”

User: *Brief pause* “Are you sure?”

Me: “Yes.”

User: “Um… Well, uh, can we fix the computer?”

I can’t exactly remember what the issue was, but we got it resolved pretty fast. While I was still at the bank, I kept getting called by the most random names. I started keeping a list just to see. By the time I left, I think the list had something like twenty names on it and there were maybe two that could possibly (if you stretched) be confused with my name.