Today's Suckiness.

[taurinejunkie]

As those of you who read my previous threads know, I have a 26-second average per call to keep. Due to various suckers, today I finished at 31. Doesn't get me in trouble per se, but takes away my bonus money I could possibly get. There were many SCs, but I can only remember a few.


Mexican't decide for himself.

I get a call from a Mexico operator assisting their customer. The search itself was pretty quick, but it didn't return any results with the right first name, only two listings by lastname + a different initial. Operator tells me to stay online and speaks with the customer in rapid Spanish. I'm still fluent enough from high school so I got the gist of it, basically different formulations of:

Operator: They only have such and such initial, no listing for the full first name. Do you want to take one of these numbers?
Customer: That's not what I'm looking for! I'm looking for *name*!

until the point where the operator told the customer (in a well-deserved firm tone) to stay online, and told me to give her both numbers.

Crazy B1tch thought she'd hurt our feelings.

It was pretty dead today (which doesn't help with keeping a low time-per-call ) so I had time to hear a coworker about a woman who told him in one breath that "I just called two minutes ago and the operator hung up on me, so now I'm gonna hang up in your face just so you know what it feels like!" and then did as she said, thus disconnecting the line before my coworker could cancel the charge as there was no search done. Now in my call center (I can't speak for others) an operator will never hang up in a customer's face without warning them first, so what the woman was saying is likely pure bullshit. Even if it had happened, she spent $0.80 just to bitch about it. And then about a minute after hearing about this I get this call:

ADAS playback: You're just a bunch of JERKS!
Me: Good evening, do you have a se*line goes dead*arch requ-

I turn to my coworker and tell him about it, he goes "Was that a 613?" (which is the area code for Ottawa & surroundings. We see area codes so we can appropriately offer local/toll free numbers).

It was a 613.

The same woman, most likely, had spent total $1.60 just to insult us. And the insult didn't affect me at all. But I'm still posting this because it completely boggles my mind how anyone could be so freaking stupid.

Why Seniors Shouldn't Call.

SC was an old woman, as far as I could tell from her voice and her general attitude of "oh this is so hard and complicated for me". But then again, she was looking for "L. Tremblay" (she didn't know the full first name) in Chicoutimi, Quebec. Which is roughly as common as "J. Smith" in NYC. And she couldn't for the life of her remember the street name.

SC: You know, the main street that goes through the city...
Me: In fact I don't know. I'll need the actual name of that street.
SC: Well it's the biggest street in the whole city!
Me: I understood that. I need its actual name.
SC: Well, it's... uh... erm... I'm not sure...*keeps on hesitating, vocalizing her hesitation all the while*
About 30 seconds later:
Me: I'm sorry, if you do not have more information I will not be able to do a proper search. You will not be charged but I will have to end the call.
SC: But... But...
Me: I'm sorry. Have a nice day. *END*

The biggest pain is that seniors can apply for an exemption number which when they mention it, lets them get directory assistance free of charge.

If I manage to find out whoever made that possible...

Well. Time to go to bed, I'm starting at 15 past noon tomorrow instead of my usual 2-3PM starting time. If I manage to find out whoever made that possible...

[MannersMakethMan]

It was pretty dead today (which doesn't help with keeping a low time-per-call ) so I had time to hear a coworker about a woman who told him in one breath that "I just called two minutes ago and the operator hung up on me, so now I'm gonna hang up in your face just so you know what it feels like!" and then did as she said, thus disconnecting the line before my coworker could cancel the charge as there was no search done.

On the plus side, that'll help keep the average times down. Shame you can't say the same about the blood pressure...

[Arm]

As far as the name search goes, I've noticed that there's a mental disconnect with a lot of hispanics as far as 'last name' goes. It may be a translation thing, I'm not really sure.

Thing is, traditionally, the kid gets named like this:
(Kid's name) (Mom's last name) (Dad's last name)

Not all families follow that, which further muddies this, of course.

But a lot of them, when asked for their last name, will respond with their mom's last name, which is their MIDDLE name. Which does exactly DICK for a records search, of course.

In English, there's only ONE correct interpretation of 'last name' and that's 'the name spoken last, or, when written down, the name all the way on the right side'. It may be that in Spanish you can interpret that different ways (though in my classes I sure never heard of that!)

I had a hell of a time when I was doing admin work with a woman who was from spain. She INSISTED on filing anyone she THOUGHT had a latin-sounding last name by their middle name.

[taurinejunkie]

I think you misunderstood, or maybe I misexplained. Mexican dude was looking very specifically for Firstname Lastname, and when the operator said they only had Initial Lastname, just repeated that this wasn't the name he had asked for. I think the operator told him multiple times something to the effect of "I know but that's all they found, do you want the number?". Back and forth for longer than an entire call should usually take.

[Arm]

ohhh, okay. Nah, I misunderstood.