How they recruit at Indian call centres:
Mujibar was trying to get a job in India.

The Personnel Manager said, 'Mujibar, you have passed all the tests, except one. Unless you pass it you cannot qualify for this job.'

Mujibar said, 'I am ready.'

The manager said, 'Make a sentence using the words Yellow, Pink and Green.'

Mujibar thought for a few minutes and said, 'Mister Manager, I am ready.'

The manager said, 'Go ahead.'
Mujibar said, 'The telephone goes green, green, and I pink it up, and say, yellow, this is Mujibar.'

Mujibar now works as a technician at a call center for computer problems. No doubt you have spoken to him.
( snee held his breath since, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:31, 15 replies)

Not exactly a call centre...but it IS related
Our office is actually a large security box - don't get me wrong, it has windows and heating and all the goodies - even air con :)

Anyway, in my little 'office' at the back, I have my own phone line which receives quite a lot of cold calls. Now, when I'm not too busy, I do enjoy having some fun so when I got a call one day from some clown selling windows, I was in my element:

"Why yes, I was talking to the good lady just the other night - I'd love for one of your monkeys salespersons to visit me..." grinning manically, I gave the postcode and number, and hung up.

The boss's "You utter cunt." just made me grin even more. I promptly forgot about the call and went about my usual daily thing (reading B3ta, occasionally doing something constructive) when my phone rang. Now, the only person who has the number is the work's manager at our other location, so I picked up the phone with my usual "Y'ello?" and got this (not exact, but close as damn it):

"Do you think that's clever?"
Me: "Eh?"
Irate Phone Monkey: "I've just had my guy drive 50 miles to your place and it's a fucking storage box!"
*Lights go on in my head*
Me: "Oh, well he didn't call in - are you sure he found the right place?"
IPM: "You cunt!" *slam*
Me: *snigger*

An hour or so later, my phone rings - it's IPM trying to order a pizza, grinning, I listen to his order, adding helpful things such as "Would you like extra panda with that?", "Sorry, that pizza only comes without cheese..." before finally telling him gently that he's supposed to call a pizza company and get them to deliver here, not call me - bless.

Not heard from him recently - I'll have to dig out the number and give him a call.

Oh, and phoning BT: I'd rather castrate myself with a rusty teaspoon.
( snee held his breath since, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:24, 1 reply)

Call centre try to electrocute me
Someone has already mentioned Tiscali call centres as being pretty shit and I can only sympathise with them.

Tiscali used to supply my Broadband service as well as my phone service. Clearly these two were not compatible, because when the phone rang, the broadband would cut out, which wasn't very pleasing when I was trying to errm...play online games.

Several calls to the Tiscali call centre left me increasingly frustrated for several reasons:
- They didn't understand my problem (I appreciate they had limited knowledge of English, but the problem was fairly simple)
- They kept hanging up on me
- They promised call backs from supervisors, which never came

They tried to tell me I need to plug the modem into the MAIN BT socket in the house, this was downstairs, the PC was upstairs, this solution was not going to happen.

Finally they told me told to unscrew the front of the main BT socket and fiddle around with the wires inside*.

Now I'm not any kind of electrician or engineer, I know fuck all about such things, but I maintain to this day that Tiscali tried to get me to electrocute myself!

*Not exactly what they said, but this was the gist of it
(porkinator is a Rock n Roll nerd!, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:23, 14 replies)

How can i help?
Some proper munters called me when i worked for a well know tour operator.

One guy called to complain because there were fish swimming beside him in the sea - why didn't we warn him

One cocksniffer demanded to know how many 'ply' the toilet paper was going to be at his hotel. 3-ply as it turned out.

when being informed that her trip to the maldives included a seaplane transfer this particular spaktard decided she didn't want to go after all Why? SHe thought she was going to have to parachute out of the seaplane.

on a busy saturday morning a proper mudstoat called in and asked if we had any 'free holidays', as his mate told hem they gave free ones away if they were leaving that day. he sounded terribly disappointed

had a nuisance mong who would call in several times a day to book a holiday to bumsexual central 'mykonos'. And would then ask for tips on where the best poof bars where. he sounded about 60 and was definitely deranged.

received a distressed call from a woman, i could hear tearful sobs in the background, she was at passport control who, on onspecting her sons passport found it was several months out of date. she hadn't checked, and now she wasn't going on holiday.

and the countless times i would tick every fucking box that these stupid fucking amoebas would set before me..find them the deal of their dreams, under budget, for them to say, well, i just want to think about it...REALLY, well why don't you think about playing a game on the motorway you fucking CUNT.

after many months of idiotic calls, i started on at this woman....mostly people would come on and say 'i want the cheapest holiday you have got' this became very fucking tiring after the gazillionth time. so i turn on her and ask her why is it that people insist on going on the cheapest nastiest holiday they can find, i mean, you wouldn't walk into a restuarant and ask for their cheapest meal, or an estate agents and ask for their cheapest house. Add to this the fact that people generally only go on holiday once a year, and for that brief time they are happy to spend as little as possible on it......she never had any answers for me.

or the shitboxes that would say 'oh, we only want a wee cheap holiday, this is the fifth time we have been away this year' etc as if i FUCKING CARE.

one of the most bizarre was a call i took from a woman, who was still on holiday in benidorm, she was calling from the hotel foyer and wanted to book again for the next year. she sounded pissed and it was only midday.

In retropsect though, i really enjoyed it, the atmosphere was very laid back and i met some good folk, and a few cunts, especially a big galloot call 'grey-ham' ;-) AND this one time i made, after tax £135 on one booking, that took about 10 minutes to complete.

call centres can be good, sometimes
(Cancer Joy was short lived, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:23, 3 replies)

South African 1500m runner opens bank account
I recently opened a bank account with Abbey (taking advantage of the multiple current accounts with Santander 6% interested rate scam) and must have accidentally had a mouse slip when selecting my title from the drop down box. I got the confirmation letter through entitled Mrs MattyLion.

I rung up the customer service number only be told it wasn't possible to change this kind of information over the phone (as if I'd had a recent sex change). I was adamant that I wasn't asking to CHANGE my gender, just get it right in the first place but no luck.

The chap kindly suggested I'd have to go into my local branch to prove my gender, I'm off into Chester this afternoon to slap my tackle on the cashiers desk, or possiby against the glass.

Incidentally why the hell doesn't the credit check they do bring up such disparity?
( JebediahSpringfield, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:06, 6 replies)

Technically not a call centre...
But a switchboard is the next best thing, right?

Apologies in advance for length and lack of funny. But it pissed me off.

Backstory: I'm unemployed, have been for just over a year (ever since moving in with Mr Tufty and out of my parents’ house). The Job Centre, as is standard practice ‘round here I believe, decide to stick me on a 3-month course to get a qualification after about 9 months of claiming JSA. Not complaining about this as I got a work placement and a decent reference out of it.
However, a week before the end of this course, I was instructed to phone the Job Centre to restart my original benefit claim. Fair enough I thinks. Here comes the tenuous relevance.

Around 3pm last Tuesday I phone the Job Centre switchboard, explain that I want to speak to someone in my local Job Centre about restarting a claim. Here's what happened:

3.pm. Get put through to the helpdesk in said building. Explain again.
3.05. Bloke on the other end of the phone has no idea what I'm talking about. Puts me on hold.
3.10. My call is transferred to the last known advisor to have handled my case, despite my explanation that she’s not the person who usually saw me and I only saw her once because my usual advisor was on holiday.
3.15. Last Known Advisor explains that rather than restart my claim, I need to make a brand new one. Gives me the number for the helpline.
3.20. Phone the helpline.
3.25. After five minutes of pressing 1, then 2, then 1 again and so on, I get to speak to someone. Explain again.
3.30. After discussion with helpful Helpline lady, am directed back to my local Job centre as I *don’t* need to make a new claim because *technically* I never stopped claiming, I just altered my claim slightly, and she can’t actually help me at all.
3.35. Fetch strong, sugary coffee and a biscuit.
3.40. Try again – repeat switchboard/helpdesk procedure.
3.45. Speak to first bloke again. LKA is now with someone. Leave name and number and await call.
4.00. Not heard anything. Not to worry, she’ll still be talking to her client.
4.01. Phone rings – not for me, it’s actually a call for the person whose phone I borrowed (I desk-hop on this placement)
4.30. Above call is ended. No messages left on voicemail.
5.00. No call, ah well. Probably finished for the day and will call in the morning.
5.15. Arrive home to be greeted by the news that LKA phoned about 4.20 asking for me and can I phone her back tomorrow please.*

So the next morning, armed with a cup of tea and a croissant (a chocolate one at that), I try again. Phone, ask for LKA to be told that “she’s away on training today, but can I help you at all?” Explain for the nth time that I want to restart my claim.

The conversation that followed went along the lines of “I’ll book you an appointment next week to sign the forms – how’s Tuesday? Oh, you’re not here… ok, is Wednesday ok? Brilliant. You’ll need such-and-such a form, do you have one? No? I can post you one… oh, you’re just down the road. I’ll leave one at reception for you if you’d like to come in and collect it later… fantastic. Just fill that in and bring it with you next Wednesday and you’re all sorted. Bye now!”

Now why couldn’t they have done that to start with?? *fumes*

*Side note: I’d stated several times that I was to be called on the office number until 5. I’m not sure whether she phoned the office phone and upon finding it engaged, decided to try the house or if she simply disregarded the number on the message and called the number they have on file, but either way it annoyed me somewhat.

/endrant
(TuftyBee should have been working on, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:06, 2 replies)

NTL twats
When my emails weren't reaching me, I had to call their "help" line (read "fuck all help line"), which I could only call during office hours.

Me: I'm not receiving my emails.
NTL: It's probably Outlook. Are you in front of your computer?
Me: No, I'm calling you from my place of work as your helpline closes at 5. And I know it can't be anything to do with my computer because when I check on the webmail there are no emails.
NTL: Let's just check Outlook first.
Me: No, my PC can't have anything to do with it for the reasons I have just explained, plus I have also explained that I'm not at home.
NTL: But we need to make sure Outlook is working.
Me: No we don't. Did you hear what I said just now? I log into webmail and there are no messages, so they aren't there for Outlook to download.
NTL: Can't we just check Outlook first? It won't tale long.
Me: Look, I know you have a script to stick to and your boss may be listening in, but I'm sure he won't mind us skipping the Outlook stage.

And so on, until I finally persuaded the guy to send a test email which I could check from work. It didn't arrive.

I was sooo glad to get shot of the useless twats, and have never again relied on an ISP for my main email address, thus allowing me to switch if they're shit without having change email addresses.
(lolwhites, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 15:01, 5 replies)

Worst Put Down I've Ever Had
My last job was as a Technical Helpdesk supervisor.
One Friday afternoon, when all the management were "at meetings", I was passed a call from an angry customer who wished to complain.
After a few minutes attempting to explain that as he hadn't paid for support for his products, he wasn't entitled for helpdesk support.
I'll add, at this juncture, that the gentleman concerned did not have a very good grasp of Englisgh and that it was obviously not his first language.
After another 10 minutes or so of trying to persuade me to send an engineer to his site, he lost his rag and called me a "shitting bastard".
It was all I could manage to tell him politely that I was going to hang up now, before pissing myself laughing!
I've never had the opportunity to top that insult, since!
(ape_hots, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:52, 1 reply)

How to WIN at Teatime Cold Calling
Ring-ring! Ring-ring!

The caller display reads 'withheld', and it being six of the evening, it can only mean one thing.

"Ye-llo"

"Good evening," says a distant voice, "Is Mr Duck available?"

Yup, it's Sanjay again.

"It's Sanjay from Debt Advice Direct and..."

"I'm terribly sorry. I'm afraid he's dead."

"Oh..."

"...very tragic..."

"I'm very sorry to hear that."

"...bizarre spacehopper accident..."

"Our utmost condolences ...what?"

"...complete rectal prolapse..."

> CLICK <

The next day:

Ring-ring! Ring-ring!

"Alright Sanj, didn't I tell you I was already dead?"

"You are?"

"Yes. Yes I am."

"I'm terribly sorry to hear that..."

"Very sad. Bizarre spacehopper accident."

"Oh GOD! Not you again!"

"This call is being recorded for your convenience and training purposes."
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:43, Reply)

Is there a war on?
December 31st 1999, and I'm working for 999. The call centre was in Newcastle right next to the Tyne Bridge, so pretty much the centre of the universe as North East celebrations go.

I'd been taking emergency calls all evening and things were surprisingly quiet. The manager had been around with some fizzy non alcoholic grape juice, and as we neared midnight, I noticed that the calls were coming in less frequently; in fact with 2 minutes to go I hadn't had the tell-tale bell in my ear for quite a while telling me that somebody had stuck a saucepan on there head or similar nonsense. I was watching the clock count down to midnight, quite looking forward to seeing the millenium in without some ridiculous non-emergency bothering me.

Then, predictably, with thirty seconds to go, the little bell chimes...

'Emergency, which service?'

A frail old lady's voice responds 'There's lots of banging and flashing outside my window'. Looking down at the address, I place a silent curse on Pontefract for starting the millenium a minute before everybody else.

'Yes love, it's New Year's Eve'.

'But it's scary, is there a war on?'

'No love, it's the millenium. It happens once every thousand years. Is there actually an emergency?'

'I think there's a war on.'

'I'm pretty sure there's not. They tell us about these things. Do you actually require Police, Fire or Ambulance?'

'I want them to stop the noise'.

At this point protocol dictated that I had to forward this call to the appropriate police call centre. Having ruined my 'seeing in the new millenium', I thought I'd not spoil some poor police call centre handlers night, and suggested the old dear make a cup of tea and go to bed. I look down at my clock and see that it's 12:01.

I missed the millenium.

On another note, whilst there was no Millenium Bug, a certain major mobile phone network did have problems due to a network overload, and all of their handsets for eight hours showed "112 calls only".

I spent from midnight till 8am on New Years Day fielding calls from folk asking 'Is that customer services?'

'No It's emergency services. The clue is when I pick up the phone and say Emergency, which service?'

'But I called 112'

'Yes, that's the same as 999. Do you require Police, Fire or Ambulance?'

'I want customer services...'

No apologies for length, I was being paid over £50 per hour.
(mongothemagnificent knows where you live, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:41, 4 replies)

I get cold-called at my girl's house every so often
The conversation usually runs something like this:
(imagine that the cold caller has an impenetrably thick Indian accent)

"Hello, I have information here that your computer is running slowly."
"I'm sorry?"
"I have information that your computer is running slowly, would you like me to fix this problem?"
"What problem?"
"Your computer is running slowly, but we have the solution."
"How do you know my computer's running slowly?"
"We got this information from your ISP."
"How do they know?"
"How do they know what?"
"How do they know that my computer is running slowly?"
"They passed the information on to us."
"So...who are they?"
"Who are who?"
"Who's my ISP?"
"ISPs are companies like Virgin, Aol, Bulldog broadband that supply you internet."
"Yes, I know that. You said my ISP passed information onto you about my computer."
"Yes, they said it was running slowly."
"So who is my ISP? If they are passing you information, you must know who they are."
"We have that information, yes."
"So...who are they?"
"Who are who?"
"My ISP."
"We don't have that information."
"Wait, you're telling me that my ISP sent you information about my computer without identifying themselves to you?"
"We don't have any information about who your ISP is, no."
"So someone, potentially my ISP, potentially someone pretending to be them - or not, since you don't even know which company this information is coming from, told you that my computer was running slowly."
"Yes sir."
"And your solution is...?"
"We have special software that will speed up Windows."
"Windows?"
"Yes sir, Windows is running slowly on your computer."
"Is this the information you got from my ISP?"
"Yes sir."
"Which you can't tell me the name of."
"Yes sir."
"I think there's going to be a bit of a problem here, you see I'm a network engineer, and all the computers in this house run perfectly fine. Windows isn't slowing down at all because my server runs Linux Apache, my laptop has Ubuntu and the Mac...is a Mac."
"So your computer isn't running slowly then?"
"Wait, let me get this straight, someone claiming to be my ISP told you that I had a computer running Windows that's too slow?"
"That is the information I have here yes."
"Yet I don't have a computer running Windows in the house."
"No sir."
"So someone has been feeding you misinformation about me, wouldn't you agree?"
"Yes sir."
"Could I speak to your manager, please?"

*repeat conversation from top of post until they get so exasperated with me they hang up*
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:38, 5 replies)

A Rare Display of Integrity?
Between GCSEs and A-levels, I decided to try to get a bit of work for the summer. There was an advert in the back of the paper for call-centre staff; I gave them a ring and they invited me around for a chat.

The "call centre" was an undecorated room above a shop. I don't remember there being a window; the light was from one 40W bulb that hung from the ceiling. There were no pictures on the bare walls, but there was mildew. The room reeked of six-week-old ashtrays.

Along one wall was a sort of workbench with some beated-up phones and phonebooks, and some plastic chairs.

The job would involve ringing people to tell them that they'd won a prize draw they'd entered a few weeks earlier, and to invite them to an address in Birmingham to pick it up. Somehow, I deduced that when they got there, they'd be pressure-sold timeshare. Should the person I called deny having entered any such draw, I was to tell them that someone must have entered on their behalf. Of course, there never had been a draw. I would simply have got to their name as I worked my way through the phonebook.

I can only assume that some people must believe this kind of story; they're the kind of dunces who spend all their money on timeshare that they've been pressure-sold.

I told the bloke to stuff his job. In the time since, I've almost convinced myself that this was due to my unwavering personal integrity. In actual fact, though, it was simply that I didn't want to spend my summer in that room in return for such a low wage.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:36, 1 reply)

Role playing
As in playing the role of someone who wants to buy double glazing/doesn't mind taking part in a questionaire.

The double glazing salesman:
stranger: "have you considered replacing any windows or doors in your property?"
me: "yes"
stranger: "how many do you want replaced?"
me: "47"
*click*

The time I took part in a survey randomnly answering "yes" or "no" to each question, went on a while until this point:
stranger: "do you have any children?"
me: "yes"
stranger: "how many?"
me: "no"
stranger: "what?"
me: "errrr, yes"
*click*

Always come unstuck on the "how many" question.
( stopmeandslapme Cometh the hour, cometh your mum, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:30, 2 replies)

Things I would rather do than call a SKY callcentre again
1) Ram a rabid starving badger up my arse while Jim Davidson tells me jokes.
2) Stick my cock in a food blender while listening to Dido.
3) Watch Hollyoaks while a blind man nails my bollocks to the floor.
4) Read a Katie Price novel as 6 inch nails are driven into my head.
5) Let spiders lay eggs in my brain while Celine Dion sings "My heart will go on".

I will never deal with Sky again, instead i'll just phone somebody I dont like while they take random amounts of money from my bank account.
( Colonel Dracula Two manky hookers and a racist dwarf, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:27, 12 replies)

Theo Profiterole
When I worked at Royal mail taking complaints about redirections some guy called Dominic Pathitis called up about something and when I looked at his account I saw the name Theo Pathitis in the names field and I asked him if it was the guy on dragons den. "Yeah, that's my dad" Cool, it made me feel a little bit famous. I congratulated him on the reggae reggae sauce deal and he said "erm yeah thanks" he was a nice guy. I later googled and found out that our friend Theo didn't actually invest. Ack. Bet he wishes he did now.
(xwoody01, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:24, 1 reply)

999
Matt was having a session at his house. One of the attendees, David, thought to himself "wouldn't it be hilarious if I dialled 999 and left the phone dangling of the hook", so he did. Imagine Matt's surprise when he made his way across the smoke filled front room to answer the knock at the door only to find four police officers standing there. "Did somebody dial 999?".

They were lucky to get away with a telling off, the rozzers could at least have given David a well-deserved kicking back at the station.
( stopmeandslapme Cometh the hour, cometh your mum, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:21, Reply)

What's in a name?
Many years ago I used to work in a call centre for a leading insurance company.*

As team leader of the I.S.T (International Sales Team), I'd have to meet up with the other S.T.L's (Sales Team Leaders) and C.S.T.L's (Customer Support Team Leaders) for a weekly M.M (Management Meeting). It was utter, utter, tedious painful bollocks. During these meetings suicide seemed like a perfectly reasonable course of action. I swear these sycophantic wankers had all been lobotomized. If you dished out two rubicks cubes, one to this lot and the other to a bucketful of pigshit, I'd have staked my house, life and knackers on the steamy pig crap to solving the puzzle first. It really was that bad.

All we'd talk about was names. They were big on names and snappy-sounding acronyms in this place. One of the particularly nasty tosspots who worked there, a middle aged lady named Tracy who scared the living shit out of me, was running one of the customer support teams: she decided her team needed a new name. And who best to come up with this name than the shower of mutated, disease-ridden pissflaps sat round the table in the team leader meeting.

After ten minutes or so doodling and trying not to fall asleep I got asked if I had a suggestion. I was never really cut out for the job, the people I had working for me said I was human and just didn't fit in. So I seemed to spend most of my time squirming and trying to blend into the scenery. Anyway, I put down my pencil, had a little think about it and - as I tend to do when I'm nervous - thought I'd play the clown:

Ho! Ho! This'll get a bit of a laugh!

So I said: "How about customer understanding and negotiation team?" And then I sat back with a shit-eating grin on my face.

The only problem was that Tracy fucking loved the name. Oh, shit...

So, a few days later when one of my team ambled up to me and said, "Err, Spanky... You see that battleaxe, Tracy..." I nodded. "Couldn't help but notice her team name's changed..." I nodded again. "And she's making a sign to hang from the ceiling above her desk..." Again, I nodded, frantically sipping at my coffee cup. "And, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure the sign says-"

You see, from a distance - and thankfully my team was based right on the other side of the large open plan office away from Tracy's team - you couldn't quite make out the '&' she'd written in smaller lettering on the sign.

So Tracy sat there, for about three or four hours before someone pointed it out to her, directly underneath a sign which had stencilled on it in big black letters:

C U N T

Technically, the sign was absolutely correct - Tracy was a cunt. Oh, how we laughed about it in our next management meeting!

Thinking about it though, I didn't last too long in that job...

*Named after a Swiss city.
( SpankyHanky, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:20, 10 replies)

The Toilet Paper Saga
At work (a cab-office, call centre essenchaly), they are always running out of bog roll. Often I would go there and they'ld be none, which is no good for me as I have chrones and as such can hold it in for a minuite or two max.

Three weeks in a row, I had to get a friend from home (I live around the corner) to come up with a packet. Not being out-of-order, I always leave whatever I bring there. I eventually worked out that his comes up to an hour's wages, so I put on a 'docket'* with the recipt, where I get a note saying "Who asked you to buy toilet paper? I did not say you can buy toilet paper". I thought this was a bit tight and out of order, so I came up with The Toilet Paper Fund...



I came back the following weekend, and there was a hand full of 2ps and 1ps. Apparently, the staff have been using my toilet paper fund to buy coffee and chocolate out of the vending machine, so I wrote another letter....



People still don't take my plight seriously, but at least everyone had a good laugh. I've taken to taking toilet paper home with me when it's there, they owe me 8 more rolls and then we're quits. I also now have a hidden spot in the office where I keep my toilet paper.


* A little bit of paper for when the cabs do an 'account' job, rather than cash, so they get paid
( G/PP &#128169;&#128169;&#128169;&#128169;&#128169;&#128, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:15, 13 replies)

Oh the joys
of working at Directory Enquiries.

"Sheer*something* in Hangar Lane, please."
"Could you spell that please, sir?"
"No."
"You don't know how it's spelt?"
"I'm dyslexic, what do you want from me?"

"March"
(I thought it was that but couldn't quite hear it, so...)
"How do you spell that?"
"Like the year."

"Could you text the number to me please?"
"Er, you're not on a mobile, are you?"
"Oh.. no.. whoops!"

"Shngjhjsnjdn in ahsudihsjandj."
"Er, I couldn't quite catch that, what was the name please?"
"Shahnsun in Hartsidnls."
"How do you spell that?"
"Tsch... I don't know."
"Well how the fuck do you expect me to know, fucktard?"*

"Deja Vu nightclub in Swanley."
"Didn't I just give you that number?"

"X in Southampton."
"Okay, and the address?"
"Flaming Fiery Funky Monkey."
"...are you sure?"
"Well, that's what I've got here...."

On top of that I spoke to Krishnan Guru-Murthy who'd been given the wrong number and was quite annoyed about it. He was very polite and angry at an appropriate level. I also spoke to Simon Cowell's ex Terri Seymour: A woman phoned up and tried to claim that she'd been given a wrong number. The guy who'd taken the call was sitting next to me and showed me what he'd given her - the right one. She wanted her money back. I took all the name and address details etc. because we have to.
"And are you the bill payer?"
"No, Simon Cowell is."
"...sorry?"
"Oh, er, never mind, don't worry about it. Goodbye."
She'd tried to claim back a 39p call.

*no, I didn't say this
(cypherspace is not a toaster, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:15, Reply)

Short and sweet
Vodafone...

I upgraded my phone on my current contract and they delivered it to my home address.

As I work all day I had to change the delivery address to my work address.

After 1 week and 5 calls to their call centre, they finally gave my work address to the couriers who delivered me my shiny new phone.

*relurks*
(porkinator is a Rock n Roll nerd!, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:14, Reply)

I'm not thick, just slow at times
I did do working for a Motorcycle Insurance Company once upon a time.
Mine job did not involve cold calling, no no, the peeps called me.
Run through details and get quotes and that. Sometimes people would call back to retrieve a quote, and as such their details were already in the system. I had to run through and check them.

Now being a naive chap I had never seen the name Cockburn written down before, although I must have heard it said.
For nearly two years I greeted returning customers with "So that's Mr Cock-Burn looking for fully comp on an R1... "
I remember once, after such a call, I decided to check how many Cock-Burns there were in the system. I couldn't believe how many people there were with that name, and I'd never met one in real life.
No-one ever pointed it out, but looking back I can remember one or two exasperated "*sigh* Yes..." from the other end of the line.

A similar thing happened with Bi-Cester, until a customer pointed it out.
I know now. My life is better for it.
(tweebianmonkey Should be known as Widget, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:10, 6 replies)

Directory Enquiries
Long before 118 118 and Google, the £1.50 per minute cash gobbling monster known as Directory Enquiries had a call centre in our town.

As a quick fingered cash strapped computer student I walked the initial tests and was put on a 2 week fully paid training program. This compromised of watching BT training videos starring John Cleese.

At the end of the 2 weeks I had already decided that this mind numbing job wasn't for me. During live training on Sunday morning I was repeatedly called by hungover men asking for the time, and we were obliged to help them because it was making £1.50 a minute!

On my first "qualified" day I was being monitored. I took an especially difficult call, hung up and said into my headset something along the lines of "fuck me, this is a bag of shit".

Within seconds I had an internal call asking me to go to the managers office. Within minutes I was out of the door. 2 weeks pay for watching John Cleese, easiest money I ever made.
(Corbo, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 14:06, Reply)

I worked in a call centre for just under a year
It was quite fun, but we were located all over the world. My department was Portsmouth, but the parent department was Scotland somewhere. Anyway, I was a specialist department, though out of house.

One of the funnier calls was when we didn't have the complete list of numbers yet. I had to call a department in India. It went like this:

Her: Hello you're through to xxx, how can I help?
Me: Hi, I'm Sam from xx department. I was wondering if you could give me the number for x department, as we haven't got the list yet?
*silence, me assuming she's getting the number*
Her: I DO NOT HAVE TO TRANSFER THIS CALL! *click*


That left me boggled.
( Methylene Blue - electrohead, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:55, 2 replies)

Callmongers
Did my time in a callcentre handling up to 7 different brands/companies. Quite often i'd forget to check the telephone display and answer with the wrong company name. Never got any proper training, and my computer knowledge was mostly about playing duke nukem.
Out of my many hats and welcome prompts, I did sales/support for an OCR software which came bundled with scanners, of course it was the "lite" edition. People had to call us to be able to register and use the software and our job was to upsell the full, pro version for almost 300 quid. Given that the scanner itself was just about 80£ it wasn't an easy job. The bonus we got for selling the pro version was around 80p, so we weren't really trying to sell it.
For many people the installation of the drivers/software went wrong and they had to call us 5 times to re-register the damn thing again. So, once I had the same guy 3 or 4 times within an hour, he was desperately late on a project involving thousands of paper pages and really needed the full version to complete his job, saying he would get fired if he didn't have it done by the end of the week.
He didn't have the money for the full version, and as he was sort of friendly I hinted a visit on "warez" sites for a full version (it was in early 1998-no torrents, mule or even kazaa in those days!).
I also took calls for Symantec/Norton. 1 hour later the same guy calls the number saying some bastard in a call centre pointed him to a site where he caught several viruses and his computer was dying. Not being very good with those virus things I told him to back everything up on his zip drive until he could talk to a proper techie. Now i've learned that backing up an infected drive on a clean zip disc isn't a good idea.
I also took calls for iomega zip drives. Glad he never recognized my voice.
(Bertie, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:55, Reply)

Teething problems
One summer I worked in a call centre for a firm that rhymes with "Doctor and Ramble". I worked on the Dutch lines, taking calls from Holland and Belgium. This was one of the lighter moments:

"Goede morgen, 'Doctor en Ramble' Consumentenservice. Hoe kan ik u helpen?"

"You sell the denture paste, right?"

"Yes, Sir. What would you like to know about it?"

"How do you get your teeth out?"

"Erm, put your thumb in and pull?"

"I'm 93, I'll break my jaw!"

"Er, I'll just check for you in the manual..."

They don't produce a manual for old men who can't pull their dentures out, unsurprisingly. I suggested a hot drink might do the trick. He didn't call back anyway.
(nothingworn didn't eat cheese on, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:50, 4 replies)

Is that the Abbey?
Not really about call centre as such but I have thought about impersonating them.

At work I have a London DDI number but for some reason a unknown funny person has diverted a 0800 number to it. The said 0800 number is one digit out from the abbey national share dealing call centre. Without fail every week I get a call asking "Hello, is that Abbey Share dealing". I am normally quite nice and inform them that they have the wrong number and give them the correct one, that is not possible while I am on holiday. So far I have had people leave me messages with account numbers, credit card numbers, home addresses and account passwords, this is despite the fact that my voicemail says something like "WOOOHHOOOOO I'm on holiday call 242 with your problems."

I guess it just proves that people don't listen to any recorded messages.
(NateGS nooob, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:39, 1 reply)

Inappropriateness
A long while back my life was so shit I decided to end it all and made my way to the top of a tower block. In a desperate attempt to see if any other human would care if I snuffed it I rang The Samaritans and heard the following;

'Hello, you have reached The Samaritans. Sorry but we are unable to take your call right now, please hold.'

And then a song played. And what was it? Only bloody 'Jump' by Van Halen.

(DISCLAIMER: May be 100% fictional)
( R.Soul hmmm, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:35, Reply)

I once needed to contact a call centre...
...following some problems with my mobile. Having heard plenty of horror stories of trying to deal with the mouth breathers that work for this particular company, it was with some trepidation that I dialed the number to complain about my phones lack of ability to do phone type things. Like make a call. Or recieve a call. I listened carefully to the options as read out by the MagicSexyRoboVoice and pressed the appropriate numbers that seemed relevant to my problems until finally I was put through to a Real Live Person...

...who was polite, apologetic regarding my phone issues and got everything sorted (ie. sent me a new phone) all quickly and without fuss.

Nope - its not funny, shocking or particularly amusing, but for may of us, as soon as the words 'Call Centre' are heard, initial thoughts are along the lines of:
"AwwwFuckssakesI'vegottodealwithafuckinStupidCallCentreMonkeyCunt!"
Whereas sometimes they are actually quite good at their jobs...



***However, a different communications company that may or may not go by a name similar to Titish Belicom really are a bunch useless wankers. Mind you they are so mind numbingly crap that they haven't billed me for my land line for over six months...***
( TheMattInAHat has a particular... odour..., Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:34, 2 replies)

Australian call centre fun
Back in the mists of time (1997) when I was backpacking round Teh World, I picked up a job at a call centre in Melbourne. It wasn't too bad to be honest (apart from the week when a select few of us had to do cold calling) - half the staff were backpackers with a sense of humour and the phones weren't ringing off the hook all the time.

Vague memories include:

1. When we (backpackers) all turned up en masse from an agency, one of the incumbent Aussie staff was a (hideously ugly) transvestite, who seemed to think he could get away with being abusive to customers, turning up late and/or pissed and generally doing fuck all, because management would be too PC to fire him. He was wrong.

2. When we were being trained how to use the computer system, one of the managers got us to send a test email each to prove we knew what we were doing. When one of the girls wrote "Torsten is the dog's bollocks" (for that was his name), we all had to explain that it was actually a compliment to save her being fired on the spot.

3. One of the junior managers was a lot more laid-back than the rest and pretty fit to boot - I'd take every opportunity to help her with any computer-related problems as it was a chance to flirt and skive, and she'd account for me being logged off for half an hour or more as "training".

4. The big boss was incredibly fit (think David Brent's boss in The Office but with extra sultry sex appeal). Way out of my league, so I was well pissed off when I heard somebody else had rooted her (to use the local vernacular).

5. One day , the customer we were working for put an advert in all the major Australian newspapers offering cheap phone calls to the other major cities. Some middle-aged/old woman from Hobart phoned up absolutely incensed that while Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth were all included, we'd "forgotten about Tasmania again", and how it was a motherfucking disgrace, she and her neighbours were treated like second-class fucking citizens etc. etc. I couldn't get a word in edgeways, so listened to a 10-minute tirade peppered with more profanity than I thought possible, then politely explained that the offer was for calls to *other* cities (as only Telstra were allowed to offer local calls at the time), and somebody in, say, Sydney, would see Hobart in their ad but not their own city. She apologised.

6. When we were cold-calling people to offer them cheap international calls, the token Aussie in the group managed to win just about every incentive (usually alcoholic) going, by signing up way more customers than the rest of us. It was only when we voiced our suspicions and a supervisor listened in that it turned out he was managing to get just enough personal details off somebody (sometimes even a credit card number) to sign them up when they'd agreed to absolutely nothing.

7. The same guy came in one day off his tits on some illicit pharmaceutical or another. It wasn't obvious in his physical behaviour, but as I was sitting next to him I soon realised that he'd thought of a comparison he was quite chuffed with, so every time he spoke to a customer he somehow managed to squeeze in the statement "it's just like wanking with a cheese grater".

Happy days? For small values of happy, maybe.
(Vice Admiral Sir Charles Cockbrush KCB MBE DSO, who is finding it increasingly difficult to log into b3ta.com wants to duck your aunt and kick your puppy, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 13:32, 3 replies)