(I recently applied to a local college. According to the application and confirmation email, I was supposed to wait for a letter in the mail. A month later (and creeping up on the application deadline) I have heard nothing. I decide to call the college to get more information, since there is no contact email or phone on either the application or email.)

Me: *calls specific college campus I applied to*

Robot: “Welcome to [College]! If you’re calling for…”

(It goes through a list of options. I select “Enrollment Services.”)

Robot: “For Enrollment services, press…”

(It goes through another list. I again select “Enrollment Services.”)

Robot: “For Enrollment services at [Campus Location], press…”

(It goes through a list of all the campuses, from which I had thought I’d already called the direct line. I select my campus location. After this, I’m routed to an operator.)

Operator: “Where would you like to go?”

Me: “I was hoping to get to Enrollment Serv—”

(Before I can even finish, I get redirected and put on hold for twenty minutes.)

Customer Service Rep: “Hi, this is Enrollment Services. How may I help you?”

Me: “Hi, I—”

Customer Service Rep: “Sorry—” *something unintelligible* “—just flew through the window. Please hold.”

(I’m put on hold for about five minutes.)

Customer Service Rep: “Hi, thank you for holding. How may I help you?”

Me: “Well, I applied about a month ago, and I was told to wait for my letter, but—”

Customer Service Rep: “You don’t actually have to wait for you letter. You actually just log in and check your status and start getting prepared for registration.”

Me: “I had hoped as much, but I’ve tried logging in. It keeps telling me I’m not registered.”

Customer Service Rep: “Well, I can help you reset your password. Just go to [Website].”

(As soon as I get there…)

Customer Service Rep: “Sorry—” *something unintelligible* “—just flew through the window. Please hold.”

(I’m on hold for another five minutes.)

Customer Service Rep #2: “What do you need?”

Me: *surprised* “Oh, well, I was in the middle of a password reset…”

(I give her all my information so she can locate my account. She resets my account, but just to be sure, I ask her to confirm my username. I had created one for the application, and used an email address, but neither of those had come up as registered the several times I’d attempted to log in previously. The confirmation email had no information whatsoever.)

Me: “I’m sorry, just to be sure, is this account attached to [email]? I tried using it as a username, but it didn’t take.”

Customer Service Rep: *pauses for a bit and continues incredibly nastily* “No, it’s [completely different username that I had not been provided with]. Have a nice day.” *hangs up*

(I assume that the username would have been in the letter I never received, but now I’m a little afraid of attending this college. I had been incredibly calm and apologetic the whole time, bounced all over the place, and still the CSRs had acted like I was a giant drag.)

(A movie viewing app on my aunt’s phone has been giving an error message and she asks me to try and fix it. I try to look it up to try and fix it myself, but when I look up the error it seems too complex for me. I try contacting the call center but since it is the weekend they are closed. I am about to give up when I realize what I had found online seems like it could be a problem within the android phone itself. So I decide to call her [Phone Brand] support center to see if they can help.)

Support: “Hello, my name is [Name]. What is the problem today?”

Me: “Hi, my aunt’s phone has been getting an error when she is in an app. It is the [App] app. When she starts a movie she is getting an error message the message is [Error Message]. From what I looked up it could be a problem with it being an android device.”

Support: “I’m sorry; what was the error message?”

Me: “It’s [Error Message].”

Support: *pause* “Have you tried taking out the battery and putting it back in?”

Me: *pauses* “Nope, not dealing with this…” *hangs up*

(It doesn’t take a phone expert to realize that if you are able to open the app then the phone is running fine. Taking out the battery is not going to do anything to fix an app. I expected suggestions like clearing cache or data but not something as irrelevant as the battery. I was just not in the mood to deal with ignorance. Granted, I get that the phone provider might not be able to do anything about it; I just figured it was worth a try.)

(I work in a call centre that receives incoming calls from customers often responding to a voicemail left on their voicemail requesting they contact us. I receive the following call:)

Me: “Thank you for calling [Company]. May I have your account number or telephone number if we have called you.”

Caller: *provides telephone number*

Me: “Thank you for that. May I ask you some verification questions?” *verifies account* “Okay, and are you returning a phone call?”

Caller: “What?”

Me: “Did we call you and you are calling us back?”

Caller: “I don’t understand.”

Me: “Did we call you and leave a message for you to call us back?”

Caller: “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

Me: *face-palm* “Okay. How can I help you today, ma’am?”

Caller: “Um, yeah, you guys called me and left me a message so I am calling you back. Why did you call me?”

Me: “Good afternoon. You are speaking to—”

Customer: “Do you know how long I have been waiting?”

Me: “The log says you have been on the call for seven minutes.”

Customer: “TWO HOURS!”

Me: “Have you tried calling before?”

Customer: “No!”

Me: “Then all I can say is the call has lasted seven, now eight, minutes.”

Customer: “No, I woke up two hours ago, and you weren’t open. I have been waiting!”

Me: “Sir, we have been open since eight am—”

Customer: “AND IT’S JUST GONE EIGHT! You need to open sooner.”

Me: “Sir, might I ask where you are calling from?”

Customer: “[City].”

Me: “And where is that exactly?”

Customer: *huffs* “F****** NEW JERSEY!”

Me: “Ah, I see. You are on American Eastern Time, which is, I think, five or six hours behind the UK, which is where you have called.”

Customer: “No.”

Me: “Excuse me?”

Customer: “You’re wrong. Everywhere follows America. Everywhere is the same time. You’re stupid. I hope you DIE! IT’S EIGHT EVERYWHERE, YOU F*****G R*****!” *slams the phone down*

(With our credit cards, if you purchase your airline ticket on them, we give you free travel insurance. The PDS (Product Disclosure Statement) for this is available online only as a PDF.)

Caller: “I want a brochure sent out for the travel insurance. I don’t want to have to print it out.”

Me: “Well, you don’t need to print it out. You can just download it, then email it to yourself so you can access it overseas on your phone if you need to.”

Caller: “I don’t have a mobile phone.”

Me: “Sir, there is a mobile number on your file, and I can see that you’re calling from it.”

(He hung up.)