Posted On: Saturday - January 27th 2018 8:55PM MST
In Topics: Humor Salesmen Curmudgeonry Americans
... ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬ ... we look forward to serving you stupidity soon ... all
Hello, this is your blogger. My name is
Alright, [enough of that - you've made your point! - ed], this post is another customer service mini-rant, which just seems to come very easily, but it's not really a big beef here, just some curiosity. You're gonna get a "customer
Business of any size, even the smallest, seem to want you to reach a phone-tree first. It can be downright silly, though oftentimes making me feel I have gone back in service to the time before Alexander Graham Bell. To add to the silliness, everyone you have to wait for, the pizza cashier, the haircut girl, or even Ravdinramal..., OK, Randy, down at the Zippy Mart is a representative if not even an associate. Does this software behind the voice system not have a few variables that can be changed? It probably does, but then the girl that runs the hair place does not, most likely, have the computer savvy to change "representative" to "hair stylist". No, it's not stereotyping ... I mean, I'm just sayin', that's all .... she's a cosmetologist, not a cosmologist,
That all wasn't even my point tonight, haha. The point is that even the smallest of businesses that need support phone lines always seem to want to act like they are a big operation. The call I made a few days back was to what had to have been a 10-man operation or they couldn't have been making any money. The good thing was that I got a girl on the line right away. Yeah, she seemed kind of groggy though. "Sorry to wake you up, but I've got a coupla questions." "Whaaa? No, go ahead." "I didn't catch you in the bathroom, did I? I got a miffed answer that sounded like it reflected off the mirror, the shower stall, and toilet paper roll. Hey, listen, I don't care. I'm glad she had the mobile phone to do her job, but I'd personally rather not be bullshitted.
Way back awhile, I ended up in a job that did involve customer technical support for a business for which I used to be a customer myself. Back when I was a customer I had not been familiar with the location of the place, and I had had in my head this idea of a room with 50 people of so in there helping on the phone. The support guys that I talked to did not help to dispel this impression either. I did seem to get a lot of "give us your number and a time to call you back", though. Well, I interviewed and found out I was one of 2 people doing all of this support, and I'd probably talked to the other guy a few times!
The next anecdote is fairly amusing, as I had called this small operation that makes, or at least probably just sells and ships anymore, a type of specialty battery. The thing is, it'd be a 3 year-period before I'd have any questions each time. Hey, I learned after some time it's always Hector! I started remembering every few years that, yeah, he's the one guy, he knows his stuff, and he's a pretty fun guy to talk to. "All of our associates are busy right now. Please press 1 for a call-back or stay on the line.", I'd get some of the time. "Hello, Hector, what happened, did you have to go take a dump?", I'd inquire, when he got a chance to talk. He was kind of amused and in no way did he deny that either.
I guess it must be advantageous for most businesses to seem like larger operations than they are in reality for customer confidence reasons or what-have-you. Myself, I am glad to hear a business is small, most times, as I know I can deal with them as human beings and not corporate drones. Ever try to get 10% off your meals at McDonalds, even if you are their best customer*? It won't work.
The American way used to be that there's nothing wrong with small and personal. Small business was the life of the economy, but that has been changing for the worse over the last many years. The small guy used to be able to get ahead with hard and smart work, but this is the age of the Globalists now. You don't just need to know someone - you have to know someone BIG.
Even small towns don't have the respect they used to, probably because all the money and people have been flowing more to the cities. There was this one guy who was proud to be from a small town, and he sung about it back in 1985. From John Cougar's studio back at his Melon Camp somewhere in the vicinity of the small town of Seymour, Indiana, and the album Scarecrow, here you go:
* A big customer is called a heavy user in that business - isn't that nice and personal, huh?
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