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Call centre staff suffer abuse from customers

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There has been a fair amount said about how useless call centre staff are, your customer service skills are lacking, the call centre has been outsourced to India etc.  Well I work in a call centre and although it isn't a very exciting job, its an honest days work and it allows me to pay the bills, put food on the table etc.

We encounter a wide range of and quite a variety of attitudes in our line of work.  Some people are pleasant, others are not so pleasant.  When ringing businesses to make enquiries I find most secretaries are an impenetrable fortress of rudeness.

We are real people you know!  There is simply no excuse for the way they treat call centre staff who have to ring them because it is their job to do so.

Call centre staff suffer abuse too A certain amount of civility has gone from communication these days.  I am sure a lot of people have the kind of mind set that means if they cannot see the person they are talking to, it is somehow perfectly acceptable to be rude, abrupt and patronising.

Call centre employees are only doing their job.  They do not get paid to have abuse thrown down the receiver at them.

A little politeness goes a long way.  So treat call centre staff as you would like to be treated yourself; you never know who might be on the other end of the line.

By: Holly


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Mr H

Mr H

I work for my local council in the customer services I deal with alot of issues from people. I love it but I get annoyed when people have a go at me and then say to me " I know its not your fault" , If you not it not my fault why are you ywlling at me , I know some people want to vent which I am fine with but not when you have a go like it is all my fault espeically when I talk abnout our policies and just because you don't agree there is nothing I can do.
20/10/14 Mr H
3
mryeje

mryeje

I am working in my second call centre. Most of the people I work with have some type of post secondary education and are very competent. I am always friendly and empathetic with the callers. I find they are never wrong and always super entitled. In my experience, speaking from emotion is rarely logical and as most ranters are incoherent and are usually fools we mock after the calls over.
06/08/14 mryeje
0
Cornish boy

Cornish boy

steveo, this is all irrelevent - you should just stick to writing to Viz.
04/07/13 Cornish boy
-1
Steveo

Steveo

"Especially when you come on the phone saying, you are now the seventh person I have spoke to, no one cares! We want to know what you want, deal with it and get rid of you and onto the next call".

And that, you ignorant, ill-educated moron, is EXACTLY the reason we hate people like you. You want to get rid of us? Well here's a shock for you, you bumbling RETARD, we don't particularly want to have to speak to YOU. If we want to mix with idiots, we will probably go to a Wetherspoons.. the reason we are calling a CALL CENTRE (clue is in the name here.. think about it..) is because we need ASSISTANCE. YOU are supposed to know about the things we are calling about. If you don't care that I have been kept waiting, then it's simple: I don't care that you are badly paid and overworked... you deserve to be if you don't care about the job you are doing. Get an education and then get a decent job, if you have the mental capacity to do so. If you don't, then you'll have to live with the cards you've been dealt... sorry, but nobody is going to employ you to do a 50K a year job if you do not have the ability to do it. That's life. Sorry and all that.
03/07/13 Steveo
-7
Fred

Fred

if you people knew what you was doing then people here would not get annoyed !!!
25/04/11 Fred
-11
call centre boy

call centre boy

yes it is true that sometimes the protocol says to transfer you have to transfer the call there is no other go , some people who sit in fat chairs and pass comments which I have read above have no clue how hectic and tiresome these jobs are and that too working in nights , lucky that we dont have gun culture in India .
18/03/11 call centre boy
-24
TopCat

TopCat

Here's a little tip - if asked whether it's a sales call, just be honest and say that it is. Calling it 'research' or just jumping into the actual sales script is only going to infuriate the people on the end of the phone. Also, why do all of these calls always have to come through between 6.30pm and 8pm? Have you ever heard of kids? If yes, what time do you think we're trying to put them to bed? Show some consideration and you'll get the same in return. I'm sure you're a really nice person and just doing your job, but these things need to be managed or regulated better.
03/03/11 TopCat
-11
Les

Les

you call centre staff are just puppets
you are told what to say what to do
how to cheat
how to manipulate decent customers regardless of how much it costs
us,so you are as bad as your bosses
just LIARS AND CHEATS
18/02/11 Les
0
MikeP

MikeP

"How about you considering the fact that if we get angry with you it's the fault of your employers and not their customers?"

Good point and on the mercifully rare occasions when I have to call these monstrous companies and I get through to a call centre, I ask to speak to someone in charge so that I can vent my dissatisfaction on someone high enough up the food chain to be paid to deal with a complaint. Usually this works, at least if not the employee knows I'm annoyed with the employer, not the person.

Many of the call centres employees are not employed by the company itself, they are contracted out and just going through a script, they often have no knowledge of the procedures or products of the company.
09/02/11 MikeP
-12
grumpyoldwoman

grumpyoldwoman

"Instead of getting angry with someone who is probably not getting much above minimum wage and may well be taking their 100th call that day, why not think about the companies who employ them?"

I see your point Gemma, but how do we communicate our anger to the company other than through the call centre? It's usually the only way we can contact them at all; call center staff are the face of the company and when we have complaints what else are we supposed to do?

How about you considering the fact that if we get angry with you it's the fault of your employers and not their customers?
09/02/11 grumpyoldwoman
-16
Gemma

Gemma

Holly's comments are too true - until you have worked in a call centre I don't think anyone has a clue just how hard the job is. Unbearably repetitive, unnerving at times (what type of call am I going to get next? Will it be someone angry? Rude? etc) and I think in no other industry are you measured to the nth degree on your availability, your performance, questioned on why you were away for 5 minutes here (so even bathroom breaks have to be justified). Because you are 'plugged into' the phone with your personal log on, absolutely everything can - and is - monitored and calls are listened to by managers and often picked apart for even tiny digressions from script.
It's no coincidence that there's a high turnover of staff, people just get burn-out after 6 months to a year - it genuinely does drive you a bit mad. Instead of getting angry with someone who is probably not getting much above minimum wage and may well be taking their 100th call that day, why not think about the companies who employ them? It's about time they understand it's not a long term tenable job unless you build in more flexibility, treat staff like adults, give the role credit and acclaim and give staff variety - for example why can't teams all be multi-ski11ed so they can spend half a day on the phone and half a day off the phone doing admin? I know this break would make a huge difference to many and chances are, as a customer you will be getting much better service from someone who has the energy and patience to deal with your call properly.
09/02/11 Gemma
-9
John

John

Seven years ago, I took a temporary job at a large utility company. I thought this was one of the worst jobs I'd had but being desparate for a job I stuck at it. My manager had a serious inferiority complex. The software we used was confusing and very cumbersome to navigate, no way to double check things, and the help system must have been designed by dedicated Comic Sans MS font fans. Most customers were pretty good and they're the ones who made the day go quicker. I had the odd few who were not pleasant, but I had more grief from my immediate manager. Verbally chastised for not making 'enough' sales one morning, I decided that I'd take the manager into one of the meeting rooms after lunch and give him an absolute b******ing for making my life a working hell. Thankfully I didn't need to because another job offer came in. Last thing my manager said on hearing of my intended departure, 'That means I cannot sack you'.

Six months later, I took a call centre job with another company (as a second job). Completely different story as the manager was so helpful, very pleasant, and although the money was crap, I had no work related stress. Being treated like an adult instead of a child helped hugely.
03/02/11 John
1
Becky

Becky

The 3 call centre in India take some beating for unhelpful, inept and stress-inducing. I pity anyone who has genuinely experienced an even worse standard.
08/01/11 Becky
13
angry man with no phone

angry man with no phone

I firmly believe the talktalk call centre staff deliberately wind up customers for some sort of enjoyment, knowing the customer has no power to make them do anything. Yes, you can threaten to cancel your contract but they will not be bothered, even if it has time to run. They tell you they have resolved the issue and it was down to a glitch in their computers and your line will be active in 48 hours, cannot promise less even though it is their fault. Then they end the call and instantly forget to do what they promised resulting in the service still not working for days. Or they connect you to the person you need to speak to, only to find it is a voicemail or a customer survey. They seem to be in competition with bt to see who can be the worst for customer services.
08/01/11 angry man with no phone
-12
grumpyoldwoman

grumpyoldwoman

As I said, if the company is just using the call centre to fob dissatisfied customers off with excuses instead of genuinely trying to sort out their problems, then yes, it goes with the job. Can you honestly say that this doesn't happen?
13/11/10 grumpyoldwoman
-10

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