Am I speaking to a human being?

[Tito]

I got this gem the other day while covering the switchboard for the operator's lunch break:

Me: *company name*
Idiot: Hello?
Me: Hello, *company name*
Idiot: Am I speaking to a human being?
Me: Yes, this is the operator, how may I direct your call?
Idiot: Oh, I have a question on my policy.
Me: One moment, please.

Excuse me while I weep for humanity....

[Evil Queen]

I usually get machines too, so i'm sorry. I'm one of the many people that will ask if I'm speaking to a machine or not.

No, I'm not embarrassed about it either. It's an honest question.

[mattm04]

Usually I can tell if it is a machine or not. Most of the time the machine voices are too perfect for a human to answer, no background noise, breathing, etc.

[Apathy]

Also, machines tend to keep talking after the greeting.

[smileyeagle1021]

you know... just once when someone asks if they are speaking to a computer I want to respond yes and then make up some accronym that my name could stand for.

[Getoutofmylobby]

I remember calling our local cable company to cancel our service and it took a good while and alot of pushing "0" before i spoke to an actual person. Of course, there is no "I want to cancel my damn cable because dish costs half as much" option.

In a way i feel for this guy. Those automated answering things suck for the most part. I especially hate the ones that make you say what it is you want and then not understand you.

[friendofjimmyk]

You know, I would weep for humanity when it comes to automated systems, but the fact is, the children of today will not be as disgusted as I am with automated systems because they've never known life without them (by the time they start dialing companies - everything will be automated and they'll know of no other way) I get stressed because I miss real, live people on the other end!

There are lots of things that happen today that used to make me weep for humanity, but then again, I'm just getting old and humanity as I know it changes so much! it's me I weep for.

[Megg]

I was once asked if I was a real person ... halfway through our conversation.

[Fiyero]

I work at an appointment booking call centre and get a lot of:
"are you a real person?"
"am I speaking to a person?"
and
"are you real?" to which I generally respond "I think I am"

Had one on Friday where they said "you sound odd", I said "Sorry I sound odd, nobody else has commented on it". I presume her phone was broken but still a harsh way to put it.

Even funnier was when I asked for a reference number (in the intro spiel) and they entered it on a key pad, me: "no, can I please take your reference number " ... beep buup baaap, "NO"

[drmike]

I was once asked if I was a real person ... halfway through our conversation.

Maybe it was someone who thought they were conducting a Turing Test

[Mamadrae]

That is when you reply "Negative. I am a meat popsicle." Do it in a tone as flat as possible to confuse them more. XD

[Jacen]

I usually get machines too, so i'm sorry. I'm one of the many people that will ask if I'm speaking to a machine or not.

No, I'm not embarrassed about it either. It's an honest question.

Personally, I prefer to talk to a computer... No offense to any of the phone operators on this board, but the computer usually understands me better... Most of the top bussinesses around here (banks, phone companies etc) use that voice system and when that fails and decides to give you to an operator, they give you to an asian (not trying to be racist) that can barely understand english and that I can barely understand.

But in response to the OPs post, I'm assuming that the Op is American and the caller is an American and that the Op has an american acent... kinda hard to miss the clues

[daleduke17]

I remember calling our local cable company to cancel our service and it took a good while and alot of pushing "0" before i spoke to an actual person. Of course, there is no "I want to cancel my damn cable because dish costs half as much" option.

In a way i feel for this guy. Those automated answering things suck for the most part. I especially hate the ones that make you say what it is you want and then not understand you.

I don't mind large places like State Farm or DishNetwork having automated systems. The thing that pisses me off to no end is when a local branch of a company (the local Kroger, a State Farm agent, etc) has the automated system. I tried calling my wife one day when she worked at one of the local Jewel-Osco stores. It took more time going through the system than the front end paging her and me talking to her.

There should be something by the local Commerce Commission (or similar) that would mandate that at the beginning and end of any automated system it should have an option of speaking with a live person. This is one of the limited times I think there should be mandates on stuff like this (but the rest of that conversation can go to fratching.com if I so choose).

[Andara Bledin]

I don't mind automated services for certain things. I like paying my bills, ordering service,scancelling services and basic things like that to be automated. It's faster for me because half the time I seem to know what I'm doing better than the rep on the phone.

However, I also think that all automated services should have an option at the end of the first list of options to go straight to an rep. Sure, a lot of people would abuse it because they're the stupid sort of lazy, but there are just too many times when the thing you want to do requires some sort of thinking being on the other end.

^-.-^

[Anriana]

I remember this cute little old man who called in and told me all about the lovely lady he had been speaking to for about half an hour. His only complaint was that she ignored his small talk and just troubleshot with him. He was talking about our automated system.



As someone who works at a call center, I actually like our automated phone system. And I've found that yelling in a foreign language gets me through other automated systems rather quickly.