Yes, Yes, YES!!!!

[AtDIelement]

I guess not really sucky as much annoying. Yesterday was MLK Day and we, of course, being the wonderful, shining examples of customer service, that we are, were open. Normal hours no less... And not your silly bankers hours, but our hours. Until 8PM in the drive thru and all that jazz.

Anywho,

All day, every two seconds the phone would ring.

SC: Are you open?
Me: Yes, we are.
SC: Until when?
Me: Normal hours.
SC: Wow!

And then any combination of "That's convenient" to "I'd hate to be you guys."

Yeah, thanks.

Two seconds later, same conversation over again.

I guess I could be overreacting a tad, but I felt like a broken record.

[Daemonmonkey]

All day, every two seconds the phone would ring.

SC: Are you open?
Me: Yes, we are.
SC: Until when?
Me: Normal hours.
SC: Wow!

And then any combination of "That's convenient" to "I'd hate to be you guys."

Yeah, thanks.

Two seconds later, same conversation over again.

You should've had an automated phone system:

"Welcome to [store]. Please make your choice:

• If you want to ask if we're open, press ONE
  1. If you wanted to ask if we're open, press ONE
     Yes We're open. Thank you for calling. Goodbye.{click}
     .
  2. If you wanted to ask if we're closed, press TWO
     No we're open. Thank you for calling. Goodbye.{click}
  
  .
• If you want to ask about todays NORMAL opening hours, press TWO
  1. If you want to hear TODAY's opening hours, press TWO
     .
  2. If you want to hear our NORMAL opening hours, Press TWO
     We're open {opening hours}. Thank you for calling. Goodbye.{click}
     .
• If you want to ask anything else apart from the two above, Press THREE
  
  Remember, We're OPEN - Transferring
  

[MoonCat]

We get that too. We're open on MLK Day, President's Day, Columbus Day, etc. Every year people call in and act surprised that we're open. So why did you call....??

[BrenDAnn]

Here's the thing that kills me about that--and I went through it at the C-store on Christmas--they call, get a LIVE PERSON on the other end of the line, and still have to ask if the place is open. I think the appropriate answer would be: "No, I'm sorry, we just have people here to answer the phones in case anyone calls. Have a WONDERFUL day!"

[JustaCashier]

We'd get that at the Hardware Store too.

We'd have a higher volume of phone calls, and probably a good 80-90% of the calls over all were asking about hours.

What I've done, like almost forever, when I want to verify that a store/business is open, since if they answer, they are most likely open, is to just ask what time they close on that day.

If it's early in the day, and they answer, but I think there's a chance they are getting set up for the day, and not actually open yet, is to say "Hi, just wanted to make sure you're open!"

Now, if they aren't opening yet for another half hour or so, they'll hopefully tell me, otherwise they'll usually say "Yes, we are! We'll be here until 7:00p.m.!"

Mike

[Seshat]

Here's the thing that kills me about that--and I went through it at the C-store on Christmas--they call, get a LIVE PERSON on the other end of the line, and still have to ask if the place is open. I think the appropriate answer would be: "No, I'm sorry, we just have people here to answer the phones in case anyone calls. Have a WONDERFUL day!"

Or they might be doing inventory.
Or someone might be catching up on paperwork/pricing/stocking/whatever.
Or they could be using the opportunity to do some maintenance.

And before you ask 'so why answer the phone?', they may be expecting friends, family, or co-workers to call for whatever reason.

[Blade]

I think the appropriate answer would be: "No, I'm sorry, we just have people here to answer the phones in case anyone calls. Have a WONDERFUL day!"

(Yes, there are legitimate reasons as mentioned above, but I've always wanted to say this anyway...)


I finally did that on Christmas!

C: Are you open?"
Me: No sir, I just like hanging out answering phones on my day off.

I said it teasingly and he was nice about it, but the best part was that when I turned around after finishing the conversation and hanging up, a group of customers had come up to the register and started laughing their butts off and high-fiving me. <grin>

[Sparky]

(Yes, there are legitimate reasons as mentioned above, but I've always wanted to say this anyway...)


I finally did that on Christmas!

C: Are you open?"
Me: No sir, I just like hanging out answering phones on my day off.

I said it teasingly and he was nice about it, but the best part was that when I turned around after finishing the conversation and hanging up, a group of customers had come up to the register and started laughing their butts off and high-fiving me. <grin>

So, one time my husband wanted to know whether the restaurant we wanted to visit was open. He called. Someone answered. He hung up. He figured he had the information he needed.

We drove there. They were closed. That's what he gets for not being polite enough to ask.

"Are you open?" is not a stupid question. Usually... But there are exceptions. Okay, I've told this story too many times, but it has etched itself so deeply in my brain that it causes brain damage if I don't exorcise it with repeated telling:

I was a bus driver. It was MLK day. City offices were closed, so calling to ask if the buses were running (we were) would not have been unreasonable. But when I pulled up to the stop, on time, IN MY BUS, in uniform, with a load of passengers, was it really necessary for him to ask me "Oh honey! Are the buses running today?"

He stood there and waited for an answer. I was too flabbergasted to think of one.