A few years ago, I worked at a call center. It was a terrible job. This place was a revolving door. We always had hundreds of calls in the queue. Getting yelled at multiple times every day took its toll on me.

One day, I had a bad call. I answered the call with the required greeting.

Me: “Thank you for holding. This is [My Name]. May I have your name, please?”

Caller: “This is Doctor [Caller].”

Me: “Hello, Doctor [Caller]. How may I assist you today?”

Caller: “I have been on hold for over forty-five minutes. What do you have to say for yourself?”

Me: “I apologize for your wait time. We have had an influx of calls today. How can I help you?”

Caller: “Someone from your company left a voicemail about one of my patients, and I was returning their call.”

Me: “Okay, may I have the patient’s name and date of birth?”

Caller: “She didn’t say who it was about. Just wanted me to call.”

Me: “Did you get the representative’s name?”

Caller: “No, she just said to call back at this number, and that’s what I am doing.”

I found that to be weird; normally when someone called, they would leave their name and direct number along with the patient they were calling about. I figured it was one of the claim managers who had called the doctor. We had hundreds of claim managers spread across three call centers, and there was no way to pinpoint who it was.

I let the caller know this, and I apologized for the inconvenience. I let him know that most likely the same person who called would reach back out to him.

Caller: “Well, I should have known no one could help. I wasted valuable time on this call.”

Me: “I sincerely apologize for your time being taken up. I know you are very busy and don’t have time for this.”

Caller: “An apology is not going to be good enough. I’ll tell you what I am going to do. I need your company address.”

I thought he was going to write a letter to complain.

Me: “Yes, sir, I can provide you with our corporate office’s address.”

Caller: “Oh, and what is your name again?”

I gave him my first name.

Caller: “I also need your last name and address. I am going to send a bill to you and your company for my time today.”

I was shocked that someone would say that. I had tried to help him. There wasn’t anything else I could do since the previous representative didn’t leave the information to retrieve the patient’s account.

I decided I was not going to give this doctor any information, and I disconnected the call. 

I couldn’t send the call to the supervisor without the patient’s name. I quit the next day. I was only at the call center for two months.

Caller: “Hi. I may need to have surgery later this year. I need to know how much short-term disability I will get.”

My department is for existing claims only; we can only provide general information on calls like this.

Me: “May I have your employer’s name so I can see what the policy is?”

The caller provides her employer’s name, but I can’t find them in our system.

Me: “I apologize; I am unable to locate them in my system. I have limited access. It’s possible that when you are ready to make a claim, our intake department can find that information out, and they will be able to further assist you.”

Caller: “I need to know how much I will get.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but I don’t have access to that employer and their policy. If I had access, I could give you an estimate based on your earnings. It’s usually a percentage, but without that policy, I am unable to assist.”

Caller: “Well, I make $3,000 a month, so what is the percentage I would get?”

I tell her again that without the employer’s policy, I do not know. I advise her that when she calls in to make a claim, the intake department will be able to tell her.

Caller: “Fine. Just one more thing: if I am unable to work ever again and I need to draw disability, how much will I get?”

Me: “Are you referring to Social Security Disability?”

Caller: “Yes!”

Me: “You will need to contact SSA for that. They have a website you can register on, and it should give you that information. Or you can always call them.”

Caller: “Okay, so how much will it be, then?”

Me: “We are not affiliated with SSA; they are a separate entity from our company. We don’t have access to your records with them.”

Caller: “Wow, you don’t know anything!” *Click*

I dealt with something like this story when first dealing with [Company], who provided a franking machine [a postal meter that marks letters] for the place where I worked. As far as I could tell from repeated attempts to speak to people about the fact that the machine had stopped working again, there was no way from the general phone line to reach a person.

Pay, yes. Request an invoice, yes. Request a top-up of the balance on your account, yes.

All automated.

Report a fault. Hahahahahahaha…

Every time, I ended up emailing the employee at our head office who had arranged the contract — which we didn’t want as our postage was too low to justify the machine, but we were forced to have it. The message would just read:

Me: “I have got the sledgehammer out again.”

She would speak to the sales representative at [Company] and yet another fruitless repair attempt would occur.

Eventually, they just took the machine away and gave us a new one.

I never did get to use my sledgehammer on the old one.

Related:
Welcome To The Call Center Centrifuge

I work in cell phone tech support, servicing the southeast USA. This caller has an accent like he’s waist-deep in the Big Muddy, and he has been a perfect customer: using a different phone, all the information available, and sharp on following troubleshooting. I’ve lost track of whether the device is on or off.

Me: “What state is your phone in?”

Caller: “Mississippi.”

He wasn’t wrong.

Related:
Technically Correct: The Best Kind Of Correct, Part 2
Technically Correct: The Best Kind Of Correct

Me: “Hi, thank you for calling [Retirement Services]. This is [My Name]. Who am I speaking with?”

Caller: “Hi, [My Name]. This is [Caller] from [Healthcare Company]. I have your client, [Client], on the line. She needs a verification statement for her benefits.”

Me: “I can help her with that, but she needs to verify her identity. Is she on the line with you?”

Caller: “Yes, sir, I can bring her on.”

After [Client] gets verified:

Client: “I’ll be honest with you: I’ve been on transfer after transfer all morning just with my benefits. Who am I speaking with?”

Me: “This is [My Name] from your retirement company, ma’am.”

Client: “Why am I speaking with you today?”

Me: “Honestly, I believe it might be because you might need a verification of income for insurance purposes. This happens all the time.”

Client: “Well, I’m confused about how I ended up here because I still don’t understand why I’m talking to you. What you said makes no sense.”

Me: “Good point. [Caller], are you on the line to explain this?”

Pure silence.

Me: “And now I’m just as confused as you are.”

Client: “Well, I’m going to hang up now. This has been a useless conversation.”

Me: “That’s all right. I am not going to take that personally. Have a great weekend.”