Ways to pass the time in a Call Centre
The spiel we got given during training was that the greatest prank ever, ever, pulled on a customer was when someone on his last day told the woman on the phone that the company was doing a scratch and win competition, and to stand a chance to win £5000 all she had to do was scratch off the panel on the card in her Sky box and see if there was a smiley face under it.

She phoned back complaining about an hour later.

This probably didn't happen I expect. What we did most of the time was pretend to be having a really weird conversation that the customer would hear a suspect part of when they were connected.

We heard a beep on the headset when the customer was being put through, and the customer would hear us saying something like:

*'Well it was a cat but who's that fussy? Hello...'
*'Glans? Hello...'
*'...kill Ghandi and marry Hitler. Hello!'
*'Yeah, yeah, with a melon - hello you're through to Sky Customer service...'

No-one ever seemed to notice though, so we stopped. Probably for the best.
(thePontificator, Sat 5 Sep 2009, 18:48, 6 replies)

Awesomesauce
I'm gonna start doing that at work from Monday. It'll stop me garrotting my colleagues at any rate!
(jamesthegill opens new tabs with his scroll wheel, Sat 5 Sep 2009, 19:52, closed)

Sorry to be dim
but I don't have Sky, what is the silver panel on the card?
( Mrs Entity is in hiding., Sat 5 Sep 2009, 23:46, closed)

chip
It's gold - a chip, bit like Chip & Pin on your Credit Cards - scratch that off and well, you won't have a smiley face anymore :)
(inder, Sun 6 Sep 2009, 10:01, closed)

The same with us
But out of house had the worst.

Sometimes you'd hear the beep, and the pc would crash, seemingly not moving. So you'd assume there was no call. Then carry on.

Whoops
( Methylene Blue - electrohead, Sun 6 Sep 2009, 15:26, closed)

Sorry to sound like a square...
but this is the reason I will never deal with SKY again, nothing ever went right, the customer service people I spoke to were utter cunts. Yes, cunts. I have worked customer service before so I was always polite, but this seemed to count against me and by the end of my time with sky I had to take names and write letters of complaint to get things done.
( Colonel Dracula Two manky hookers and a racist dwarf, Mon 7 Sep 2009, 12:25, closed)

I sympathise
The system at the call centre I worked at was appalling - 13 hour shifts so by the end of the evening you need to muck about like that or else it becomes impossible. The staff turnover rate was 100% so no-one ever had much experience.

If your inclination was to be helpful there were limits to what you could do. People were listening often and every time you said 'Look, I'm not supposed to do this but...' they would take you to one side and say 'We're a business.'

Having some fun at the start of the call was the best we could achieve without actually telling the stupid customers to fuck off.
(thePontificator, Mon 7 Sep 2009, 22:10, closed)