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Okay, I mentioned in Gravekeeper's post this week that I haven't really had any sucky customers yet... mostly true... but what I have been getting is REALLY STUPID PEOPLE!
I work on the COMMERCIAL side of billing inquiries for the local electricity company. These people OWN BUSINESSES. And yet, so far, the most common scenarios I encounter when answering the phone are:
- people who are receiving bills for electricity for a location that doesn't belong to them. The average case, people have been PAYING BILLS for SOMEONE ELSE, for over a year. That means it's taken them TWELVE MONTHS to clue in that they're either paying one bill too many every month, or they've never caught on to the fact that they haven't been receiving their own bills.
- people who are so far behind on their payments that they're about to be cut off. This is a business. Who the hell doesn't pay their BUSINESS's bills until their power gets cut off?? If the business is doing that poorly, maybe you should close your doors and try again when you get a clue.
- people who haven't got the vaguest clue how to read their bills, and so can't figure out how much they owe (or, as in one call I got earlier today, aren't smart enough to figure out that one amount is BEFORE TAX, and the other, larger, amount, is TAX INCLUDED).
- people who want to go on the equal monthly billing plan so that they can take the huge amount they currently owe us and spread it out over several months. That's not how equal billing works. YOu have to PAY the huge amount you owe FIRST, then we'll put you on equal billing to control your FUTURE charges. What you're talking about is a PAST DUE PAYMENT PLAN, but try explaining that to these people.
- people whose spouses or bosses have never bothered to add them to the account, and then they (and the bosses) get pissed when I can't give them any information related to the account.
*sigh* People is dumb LOL
I work on the COMMERCIAL side of billing inquiries for the local electricity company. These people OWN BUSINESSES. And yet, so far, the most common scenarios I encounter when answering the phone are:
- people who are receiving bills for electricity for a location that doesn't belong to them. The average case, people have been PAYING BILLS for SOMEONE ELSE, for over a year. That means it's taken them TWELVE MONTHS to clue in that they're either paying one bill too many every month, or they've never caught on to the fact that they haven't been receiving their own bills.
- people who are so far behind on their payments that they're about to be cut off. This is a business. Who the hell doesn't pay their BUSINESS's bills until their power gets cut off?? If the business is doing that poorly, maybe you should close your doors and try again when you get a clue.
- people who haven't got the vaguest clue how to read their bills, and so can't figure out how much they owe (or, as in one call I got earlier today, aren't smart enough to figure out that one amount is BEFORE TAX, and the other, larger, amount, is TAX INCLUDED).
- people who want to go on the equal monthly billing plan so that they can take the huge amount they currently owe us and spread it out over several months. That's not how equal billing works. YOu have to PAY the huge amount you owe FIRST, then we'll put you on equal billing to control your FUTURE charges. What you're talking about is a PAST DUE PAYMENT PLAN, but try explaining that to these people.
- people whose spouses or bosses have never bothered to add them to the account, and then they (and the bosses) get pissed when I can't give them any information related to the account.
*sigh* People is dumb LOL
"You'd feel a Hell of a lot better if you'd just rip into the occasional customer."
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