Kharmic backlash?
Jul. 24th, 2004 01:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
framlingemDid I ever cause anybody a lot of problems? Was I cruel to a customer service rep? Or have I just been enjoying myself a little too much recently?
I don't know what it was tonight, but I did not have a single easy call. The ones which should have been easy took three times the time they should have taken, because my software was malfunctioning, or there was a language barrier (my company serves Ontario, so we get a lot of recent immigrants to Toronto from southern Asia, who tend to speak veryveryveryfastandhavethickaccentsandkeepinterruptingmewhenI'mtryingtofindoutwhatIcandotohelpthem!), or it was just something complicated. I had one person who yelled at me more than my mother did when she foudn out that I'd... er, never mind :p.
For example, I had one customer who wanted to transfer her cable and internet services to her new account. Usually? ten minutes, tops. It took forty, because a)halfway through my system booted me out and I had to start from scratch, and b) her previous landlord had covered about forty dollars of her cable cost, so her bill suddenly shot up, and I had to go through all our options with her to try to find the best deal. Naturally, this was my last call of the night, and I was still on the phone when everyone else packed up and left. Very disheartening.
That customer, furthermore, while having very good English, was clearly not English-speaking as a primary language. (Her name was Korean). The new street name was something along the lines of "King's Dock", and she originally didn't give me the apostrophe, so my system didn't find the street. I asked if there was an apostrophe in it. "What's that?" she asked.
It is amazing how many ways there are to explain what an apostrophe is. I finally settled on "are there any marks in the street name which aren't letters?"
Meanwhile, my buddy Shannon was keeping me company, and laughing his butt off at my apocalyptic apostrophe problems, which was in turn making me laugh, because I was fully awayre how ridiculous I must have sounded.
Shannon may possibly be the reason I didn't break down in tears of sheer frustration, because tonight was like banging my head against a series of reinforced brick walls. He made me laugh when I needed to - he's like Doc Webster as far as making people laugh goes. What a gift. I'm going to make him a little thank you card :)
Oh! Funny!
Yesterday I had a call from a lady who asked "Can I have a rebate? There's nothing ON!"
I came home tonight and read your entries, and that made me feel a lot better, in a "look! people who aren't rude, blockheaded, mulish idiots!" sort of way. I love you all - thank you.
I don't know what it was tonight, but I did not have a single easy call. The ones which should have been easy took three times the time they should have taken, because my software was malfunctioning, or there was a language barrier (my company serves Ontario, so we get a lot of recent immigrants to Toronto from southern Asia, who tend to speak veryveryveryfastandhavethickaccentsandkeepinterruptingmewhenI'mtryingtofindoutwhatIcandotohelpthem!), or it was just something complicated. I had one person who yelled at me more than my mother did when she foudn out that I'd... er, never mind :p.
For example, I had one customer who wanted to transfer her cable and internet services to her new account. Usually? ten minutes, tops. It took forty, because a)halfway through my system booted me out and I had to start from scratch, and b) her previous landlord had covered about forty dollars of her cable cost, so her bill suddenly shot up, and I had to go through all our options with her to try to find the best deal. Naturally, this was my last call of the night, and I was still on the phone when everyone else packed up and left. Very disheartening.
That customer, furthermore, while having very good English, was clearly not English-speaking as a primary language. (Her name was Korean). The new street name was something along the lines of "King's Dock", and she originally didn't give me the apostrophe, so my system didn't find the street. I asked if there was an apostrophe in it. "What's that?" she asked.
It is amazing how many ways there are to explain what an apostrophe is. I finally settled on "are there any marks in the street name which aren't letters?"
Meanwhile, my buddy Shannon was keeping me company, and laughing his butt off at my apocalyptic apostrophe problems, which was in turn making me laugh, because I was fully awayre how ridiculous I must have sounded.
Shannon may possibly be the reason I didn't break down in tears of sheer frustration, because tonight was like banging my head against a series of reinforced brick walls. He made me laugh when I needed to - he's like Doc Webster as far as making people laugh goes. What a gift. I'm going to make him a little thank you card :)
Oh! Funny!
Yesterday I had a call from a lady who asked "Can I have a rebate? There's nothing ON!"
I came home tonight and read your entries, and that made me feel a lot better, in a "look! people who aren't rude, blockheaded, mulish idiots!" sort of way. I love you all - thank you.
