I Tried to Vanquish a Button-Monkey Today

[Dips]

I've complained a bit about "Button-Monkeys." These annoying people will call when we are all busy, get shunted to voice mail, hang up, hit re-dial without leaving a message, then repeat until somebody picks up the phone or they finally leave an indignant message about how bad our customer service is.

Our worst offender is one of our resellers. They are jerks who treat their customers badly, so I guess they assume we're going to do the same to them. They've seriously kept the phones jangling for twenty minutes straight. Since we always return calls ASAP, all it accomplishes is stressing us out and pissing us off.

Anyway. The reseller called and did the same thing AGAIN. I was the only one answering phones today and helping a nice lady who took some time to help.

The final five minutes of the call were punctuated with almost constant ringing because of the BM.

Now, my philosophy of the phones is this: I do not take any new calls until I've checked the voice mail and returned calls to those who have left a message. The people who have left a message called first, followed procedure and have been waiting the longest. Therefore they take priority.

So I picked up the voice mail. The entire time I was listening to it, the phones were jangling away:

Message 1: [click]

Message 2: [click]

Message 3: [SIGH!] [click]

Message 4: [click]

Message 5: Gee. It would be nice if you'd answer your phones. I'm from Such-And-So Products and I need to talk to someone RIGHT AWAY about the package you shipped me. My number is xxx-xxx-xxxx. [I recognized this as the button-monkey reseller].

I wrote that down and got the next message

Message 6: Hi. I need tech support? My license is xxxxxxxx and my number is xxx-xxx-xxxx

Messages 7-14 were all: [click]

So I answered message 5 first because it came in first. The phones were still jangling. Surprise! I got VOICE MAIL! He must have been on the phone or something.

So I left my own message for him: Hi! This is Dips from Awesome Software, returning your call. Our number is xxx-xxx-xxxx. I understand that you have a question about a product we shipped you. If you call back, please let me know the license or serial number of the product so we can better answer your question. We are open until 5pm today and will open again at 9am on Monday. Thank you.

The phones are still ringing away while I return Message 6. She was a very nice lady who needed talk to Carl, so I transferred her to him.

Then I check voicmail again and got a series of messages which were all [click].

THEN I answered the ringing phone.

It was Such-And-So Products. He was irate as usual and complained that it took so long for me to answer the phones. So I apologized:

"I'm so sorry about that. Luckily, I did get your message and return your call. Did you get the message I left in your voice mail?"

Of course he didn't. He was too busy being a twit. But I had to pretend I was concerned. So I repeated my request for the license or serial number and got his question answered. As it turns out, of course, he had the information in front of him the whole time, he just didn't bother to read it because (say it now) he was too busy being a twit.

I guess he didn't like feeling foolish because he decided to bitch some more about the phones. So I decided to be a bit extra helpful and informative:

"Yes. I'm sorry about that. I must have been on the phone when you called. At least you left a message so I could call you back. You wouldn't believe how many people don't. In just the last ten minutes I had about twenty hangups and it took a bit of time to clear all of them out."

"So you were returning calls when I was trying to reach you?"

"Of course. I wouldn't want to keep somebody who had to leave a message waiting too long. Yours was the first actual message and, naturally, I returned it first. I ended up with your voice mail, but I did call you back right away. I'm sorry you missed my call."

"That's because I was too busy trying to reach you."

"Oh. You must have called while I was calling you back."

I can't call you a dumbass, but I just laid out a series of dots for you. All you need to do is connect them. C'mon, you're almost there.

"You just need to answer your phones!"

Sigh. Some people CAN'T learn.

[Writer Cath]

I can't call you a dumbass, but I just laid out a series of dots for you. All you need to do is connect them. C'mon, you're almost there.

Man, you're asking an SC to use logic. I thought you knew better by now. The workplace is clearly a logic-free zone.

[myswtghst]

We get the lovely people who don't seem to understand that sometimes tech support is busy, and that hanging up and calling back when I put you on hold for more than a minute to get them isn't going to get you through to tech support any faster. This is particularly fun when they call back and get me again, and I explain that had they held on just 15 more seconds, or given me a call back number, I could've already gotten them to tech support, instead of jumping back to the end of the queue.

Congrats though, you did a fantastic job with this guy. Too bad he was too dumb to realize where you were leading him

[CrazedClerk]

I've called a few of those lines. Quite a few now have automated "please do not call back multiple times" messages within their standard automated message.

People can't seem to understand how a calling queue works. If you keep calling back, you keep getting pushed to the back of the line. Sadly this happens to people and they get upset at the poor person on the other end of the line for having crappy customer service.

Well if you took a moment and thought about how the system works...

but we all know SCs never do that.

[Dips]

Update:

To my supreme shock, the reseller in the OP called today while I was on the phone and...

left a message! Just one!

Then he waited patiently for ten whole minutes for a call back without hitting re-dial once.

If it happens two days in a row, I'm going to declare him cured.

[JuniorMintz]

Gawd, why are automated phone systems like that so hard for people?!? Even my own coworkers bitch about them and tell me I'm wasting my time when I use them, which is reason #5396 why I hate them.

I order frames for people on a daily basis, and many of our vendors are on the east coast-thus, their offices close at about 3 pm in my time zone. All but one of them offer a voice mail ordering system, and the last one has it but it's set up in very stupid manner so I just write down my order and call it in during business hours the next day.

It's SO FREAKING SIMPLE!

"Hi, my name is JAM and I'm calling from Crummy Little Optometry Office, my office phone number is blah blah blah, my account number is bliddy blah blah, and I would like to order the OverPriced Designer Line model number "Soon to be grossly marked up" in chartreuse with an eye size of 53. Please mark it for patient "Ima Jackass", and we would appreciate a phone call when you get this message with a confirmation number for our records. Thank you so much!"

And EVERY SINGLE TIME I've used voicemail, I get a call back with confirmation-usually within the first hour of my shift!

I just don't understand why anyone would object to something as useful as voicemail... then again, I don't understand lots of things, and trying to follow Idiot Logic will only give me brain cancer.