goodcow said:
After numerous attempts trying to get the FedEx automated phone system to connect me to a human customer service representative, I had to yell at it, "Let me talk to a fucking human being," and bingo, it transferred me.
Ugh, I've developed a renewed hatred for those things recently. There's two things that bother me the most, though:
- Piss poor attempts at voice recognition. Sears' system is like this. They don't allow you to talk to a person right away, so in order to get through to the department you want to talk to, you have to speak to their machine, which apparently can't recognize a single word. I used to work there, and wanted to get transferred to my department (home electronics)....
The Machine: "Please state the name of the department you would like to speak with."
Me: "Home electronics."
The Machine [in an overly chipper tone]: "I'm sorry, I didn't understand that. Please state the name of the department you would like to speak with."
Me [louder and more clearly]: "Home electronics."
The Machine : "I'm sorry, I didn't understand that. Please state the name of the department you would like to speak with."
Me: "
Home electronics!"
The Machine: "I'm sorry, I didn't understand that. Please state the name of the department you would like to speak with."
Me: "WHERE THEY SELL THE FUCKING TVs!"
The Machine: "I'm sorry, I didn't understand that. Please state the name of the department you would like to speak with."
...
Repeat for "back office", "main office", "operator", etc. Finally, I somehow get transferred back to a person, who instead of putting me through to the correct department, just bumps me back to The Machine again.... Ugh.
The other beef I have with these systems is the initial information gathering phase. Depending on the company I'm talking to, I often have to enter account #s, phone #s, first three letters of my last name, etc. I wouldn't have a problem with this. I actually prefer it to reading my info off to some idiot on the other line. My problem comes from the fact that without fail, the first thing the people ask for when I finally get through to someone is the exact same information I just entered.
