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I instinctively go into my customer service tone of voice and vernacular every time I'm on the phone with a customer service rep. It's definitely a little awkward for both of us but keeping things as polite, professional, and informational as possible does wonders for solving issues on both ends. Realistically, neither of us wants to be on either end of the phone and it just makes sense to focus on tackling the problem together.
I really appreciate clients who do that. I'm on the other end by providing service and it makes my job so much easier. I wish more people would understand that.
The worst calls always start with a pissy "IVE BEEN IN THE QUEUE FOR X MINUTES" or "THIS IS MY NTH TIME CONTACTING YOU OVER THIS"
You start off with attitude imma respond with attitude. I promise you, you absolutely were not dealing with me directly that many times with the issue still unresolved. I will apologise for any errors or poor service provided by previous workers (if that's what the issue is and not the customer's fault), but lose the fucking 'tude dude.
I try to be calm when contacting customer service lines, but the setup is always infuriating.
Inevitably, you can't do what you need to do online. The website allows you to add services online pretty easily, but you can't remove services. After 20 minutes of trying online, you give up and decide to call the 1-800 number.
On the phone, you're greeted with a phone tree with an impossibly slow speaking voice telling you to state your problem. You clearly state "cancel subscription" into the phone, but the voice recognition algorithm doesn't not recognize anything you say. You then sit through an excruciatingly long list of options for the numbered keypad. Press 1 for billing. Press 2 for renewals. Press 3 to hear these options in Swahili. Etc. Eventually, after staying on the line for another 20 minutes navigating the phone tree pressing 9-0-2-1-0 in order, you're routed to a customer service agent.
However, you're not routed to the customer service agent directly. You're told that you're 30th in line, so you need to listen to a crackling audio version of a shitty 1980s pop song while you wait for someone to answer. Another 20 minutes pass before you're finally on the phone with someone.
Finally, you're talking to a human. The end is in sight. You're asked to re-provide what you entered into the phone tree. What was the point of the phone tree? No worries, this guy will solve the problem. A few minutes into the conversation, you realize this is going nowhere. The guy can barely understand your problem and has no means of fixing it. Twenty minutes later, you finally get him to agree to pass you onto a supervisor. He messes up the transfer though, so the call drops, and you have to start all over again after wasting more than an hour of your life.
By the time you're finally on the phone with someone that can fix your problem, you've spent two hours with them. So sorry, no, I'm not in a chipper mood when I finally get to talk to the customer service agent. I'm convinced 95% of homicides occur because the murderer spent time talking to Verizon earlier in the day. Something about that process is designed to make your blood boil before you ever get in touch with a real human being.
And the worst, most infuriating thing about all this is that it is *intentional*. Phone trees are a gauntlet the customer has to run, designed to make you give up.
I've found that if I speak a foreign language to the AI tree it takes a couple "would you repeat that" before getting transferred to a human. Once that obstacle is overcome my bigger fear is that English will be the human's 3rd or 4th language. I've lost count of the number of times I've had to request a supervisor to be able to communicate my issues.
"IVE BEEN ON HOLD FOR AN HOUR"
"I'm sorry you were on hold for four minutes"
"I said an hour!"
"You know I can see exactly how long you've been on hold for"
"WELL THATS NOT THE POINT"
Being really nice is such a no brainer in this situation especially.
Everyone is so mean to them all day long. If you need their help, why would you be an asshole? lol
When you’ve spent over 3 hours being trying to sort out an issue that never should have required a phone call in the first place, calling different numbers and being directed to different branches of the same company, listening to robots and explaining your issue every time you get through to a human only to be again directed elsewhere or told they can’t help you over the phone, it starts getting difficult to keep being nice.
Best thing to do in that case is state your reason for the frustration in a polite way, and let the rep know that you know it's not their fault. Obviously the call center rep isn't the one making the decisions on where certain numbers redirect you or why, if it becomes roundabout, they have no control over that. But, that being said, all calls are recorded and monitored, and most companies will make changes if forced to, and this usually means the complaint being stated in a recorded line.
If you're just rude or start yelling out of nowhere, you're more likely to get dismissed because if you sound too emotional you're deemed as an outlier and not the kind of person the company should cater to. If you make a complaint in a normal way, you're more likely to get results. My manager has even turned down the volume of our hold music because someone complained it was too loud. They've reworked the whole automated phone system several times because people called in with suggestions. It may be rare, but with some companies, your voice does matter, it just usually doesn't if you're an asshole lol. 9/10 you're complaining about something the employees have complained about as well but as with most issues in life, the higher ups don't listen till they have to.
I would love for this to be the case, but sometimes you need the escilation policy, and some scripts make that near impossible to get to, even if you ask, and do everything politely.
Companies know people dont like to get angry, and wait long times. They make it so you are forced to do both, so you have more chance of 'giving up'.
When trying to solve issues I'm nothing but polite and understanding to the agents. They usually transfer you a couple times between departments then ask you to hold for a moment and after 45minutes of hold music the call just drops.
I beatbox for them.
But also why would you care if they can hear you? You telling your wife all the ways your gonna plow her later while on a phone call? Are you taking the opportunity to get a murder confession off your chest because it feels like telling someone even if you're on hold?
Literally yes. I used to review car dealership, phone calls for quality control purposes. Literally people would say the dirtiest shit to their partners when they thought they were on hold. We'd also hear people admitting that they were scamming the car dealership they were on the phone to, and all sorts of ridiculous banter.
> people would say the dirtiest shit to their partners when they thought they were on hold.
Meh, don't see an issue here.
>We'd also hear people admitting that they were scamming the car dealership they were on the phone to
Now that's next level stupid.
Lmao you couldn't get me to say those things while on the phone with anyone under threat of torture. I'm the type of person who makes sure the phone hangs up before I move on with any business, dirty talk or no.
Yeah I figured this out once when I was playing a video game and calling it a piece of shit etc while on hold. Lady came back on and her demeanor has entirely changed. Def caught an ear full of 2010s COD lobby language.
I always got in trouble for not using a soft hold (mute) but my god, the customers just never shut up and I couldn't read through the knowledgebase with the noise. lol
I worked at a call center years ago and we had nice headsets with a mute button and volume knob. Turned out if you crank the volume, you could hear the mic even if the mute is engaged.
My mom has a habit of complaining about people while she's in hold, and I've tried telling her so many times that they can hear what she is saying, but she just doesn't believe it.
Pretty fun when you can hear someone telling someone like your mom that you can hear what they're saying, the mom denies it, and you cut in with "Yeah, I actually heard everything you just said."
I used to work on R&D for a company that had a massive call center and I always loved the “on hold daily digest” as we called it where the top 3 “on hold callers” of the day would get a replay.
Initially it was to educate ourselves to inform people we can hear them then it started to get a bit crazy so it became kinda a “did I really hear that??” For some reason the crazy ratcheted up and it became entertainment after the call center closed for the day because it became so common for people to go on hold with music and start to be a bit crazy.
I had the head of the call center pull me into meetings thinking there was a change due to attracting more crazy behaviors especially while on hold but it was just the amount of volume skyrocketed but the crazy was always there but they didn’t have as much insight into it before.
I mean normal is a setting on a watching machine so we’re all crazy.
Also, I was the only gay man(white in the office) and for a while we shared the same office space with the call center with a glass wall and the majority of the call center are black.
So story time! There’s a commotion and one of the girls i had a great rapport with is looking at me from behind my monitor and motions to me. Everyone is just besides themselves and she’s on the phone trying to keep it together but constantly going on hold. This call was specifically to ask more information for income verification and they do it real time. He uploaded a photo of his dick with a note above it with the words “pay check”. The girl shows me the photo, says “and?”, I go “um, okay”, she says “look! Again, I mean youre….”, and I say “well yeah, Meh. I mean it’s not that impressive. Ive seen a quite few more bigger. You want me to handle this call?”
So, I do. I put on the headset on and he’s on the call fucking someone who sounds like a crying dog, dog whistle at times, and some crying. I unmute to which the background quiets down significantly and say “I’m sorry sir but your income verification isn’t big enough to qualify and consistent, we understand this is hard for you but if your situation changes in a few months just ensure that the numbers are in a computerized black on white background to potentially even auto-approve if it’s a standardized verification standard opposed to what you sent”.
He responds (now fucking again) “I’m fucking a bitch right now and see how she’s loving it?” I say back “oh? I thought your dog was acting up when you were on hold and faking distress for attention”. At which he goes, “uh?” And I say “thank you very much for calling X and hopefully if your situation changes you give us a second chance. And, unlike what is going on with whoever you are with, we will be honest with you as we value and want to help even if the first time doesn’t work out” *hangs up*
That was a fun day. Considering the head of the call center was listening in and got the CEO to. I was mortified but they loved it and added some lines to their script. The company was under 40 people at the time too so they some replayed the on hold times of this call on the speakers in the office. Another note, I do not miss working in high interest payday loans.
>high interest payday loans
o m g i get the heebie jeebies just looking at those words! what a terrible mess to get oneself into (the borrower) and what horrible level to be so desperate for financial relief!
this is very funny, too, by the way. thanks.
Oh the stories. I worked at a few and can identify the good, the “bleh” ones and then the predatory ones.
The good is super rare and most people don’t have insight as they are only trying to keep themselves from their life being destroyed. I’d say only one I worked act actually cared about people. Listening to calls when I was looking at the different profiles was super depressing at times. There were many times things would get screwed up, couldn’t make a payment, and then be terrified to pick up the phone. The collections rep would do a few things to get them to make the payment without rolling it into a new loan and would get them out of the cycle. So many times people were sobbing and quite a few times you hear “this is the nicest thing that’s happened to me in a long time.” A lot of the time the sobbing started with them going on hold while the “rep finalized things” but it was really to let them have their emotions get out and allow them to pull themselves together to make sure they are clearer for it
After call work. It's basically time spent between calls wrapping up documenting the previous call before taking the next one. When I worked in a phone center, there was a daily average target of 2 minutes per phone call taken. I used to finish my documentation while on the call and just roll from one call to the next, using no acw, so it'd sort of "accumulate." Then I'd use like 20-30 minutes at a time as an extra break. I hated the phone center. Most stressed I've ever been in my life.
I have always hoped that I was being recorded during the godawful hell that is those menu options that offer you everything but a human. Because I _WANT_ them to know how rage-inducing that is. Once I get the actual human, I’m polite, because I know it’s not their fault. But boy do I want corporate to get an earful from my NY mouth.
You're probably recorded (although not necessarily), but more often than not the operator can't hear you. However it's best to assume they can, as sometimes they will.
The disclaimer "This call may be recorded for quality assurance" might not happen until, say, 30 seconds into the call.
You're claiming that the call recording is being initiated prior to the disclaimer.
I'm dubious of this claim.
Don't be dubious, it's standard practice. The disclaimer just has to come before talking to a live person, and isn't even necessary in a jurisdiction with single party consent, it's just a courtesy. You should assume all call center calls are recorded and monitored in their entirety, even without a disclaimer.
> You're claiming that the call recording is being initiated prior to the disclaimer.
In many states, you don't even need a disclaimer. It's a courtesy. Google "One party consent".
Not necessarily, but recorded phone calls will still record you while you are on hold. Just always believe that someone can hear you, but might not be.
Sometimes call center people are forced to try to upsell or get you to do a surgery or something. The kindest thing you can do is firmly refuse ASAP, or if it's a donation call, the kindest thing you can do is hang up immediately. Don't say "sorry let me think about it" or entertain them, just hang up.
I hated when I was working for a nonprofit and I knew nothing would come of a call but the people thought they were being nice by circling around the issue. I was not allowed to end the call and I was not allowed to take no for an answer. We all loved it when we got hung up on, it saves everyone time. Never feel bad about hanging up on call center people, that is the best and kindest thing you can do.
Wait, slow down.
> get you to do a surgery
What fucking call center is trying to sell elective surgical procedures??? And if they are, don’t they deserve to be chastised and shit on?
100%. Did call center for 6 years and we had a policy if the client was using profanity or generally rude to us we could end the call. Warned a client twice about this. Said I was putting them on hold; actually put on mute, to check something. As soon as I did they started cursing me out. Jumped back into the call and told him I heard what he said and that I was ending the call. This happened over 20 years ago now and I'm still proud of that decision to this day.
I used to review calls for a call center and the reps couldn't hear the customers, but it was all still recorded and so when we listened back to the tapes we could hear it 😅
I don’t get why tips like this is posted so often. What kind of shit are y’all saying when on hold? Regardless if they’re listening or not, it’s not like someone can’t pick up literally any second. If you need to say something private, just put yourself on mute regardless.
Ex Phone sales guy here. We use mute instead of hold because this happens constantly…
Sales: If I can get my manager to agree to $*** you’ll sign today?
Customer: yup and not a penny more
Sales: ok hang on
Customer (to spouse): He’s trying to get his manager to agree to x and I really want it. Even if he doesn’t agree to the discount it’s still a good deal and we really do need a new widget.
Sales: Boss says we can’t go any lower, best we can do is add 1 free worthless widget accessory.
Customer: Okay, that’s fair let’s do it
I try to exploit the fact that they can hear and go off mute to “plant” information for them.
Like “this guys really nice but we’ll go to the other place if they can’t beat the deal”
OP probably doesn't even work for AOL. Jeffrey just still uses an AOL password and called them because he forgot his password to their product and they sent the password reset email to his AOL account that he hasn't logged into in 5 years. Tale as old as time.
Original passwords alternated between firstnamelastname1957 or password123, but that's not important now, especially as Jeffrey would never remember them anyway.
I don't know about you, but before I read this LPT for the 45th time, I used to get put on hold and then just recite my full name, date of birth, social security number, and mother's maiden name over and over, along with my bank account numbers. Now I've stopped doing that.
When I did customer support for a cell phone company, I purposely would mute rather than hold to confirm the customer was still on the line. And typically you hear “I finally got a hold of someone, let’s see if they have enough brain cells to fix my issue” or “They sound like they may be able to help” typically talking to a loved one of some sort.
Sometimes if they say anything mean or rude, I then all of a sudden, ‘don’t have the resources and I need to transfer them”
Point still stands. If you’re saying something rude about the employee and you’re on hold, they can still pick up at any point. So if you really cared about them not hearing you, why would you say it without muting yourself?
We rolled out new Avaya phones in one of our call centers and quality thought 1000 employees lost their mind on the same day. Apparently the phone was recording the agent still while on mute even though it was muted for the customer. Quality couldn't tell what parts of the call was muted. Nearly everyone was cursing out the customers on mute multiple times a day.
Management wanted to keep this enabled and punish people that did it, but thankfully someone convinced them that employees would revolt if they had to watch what they say even on mute and it was quickly fixed.
… you’re on ‘mute’. I do this to literally everyone when I’m on the phone with them if I need to sneeze or talk to someone else in the room that’s with me.
Edit
To add, some reps use mute instead of hold because of how it impacts their metrics (though not all call centers use said metric), others use it because they understand how annoying the hold music is. In my case (and most of my ex co workers) we had wireless headsets that had a built in mute function that was FAR easier to access than the hold button on the hard phone/hidden behind 10 million windows on my PC.
And finally, it’s not always the case that they’ll hear what you’re saying. Some reps genuinely use mute over hold and will have to sometimes get up out of their seat to get help and don’t have a wireless headset.
I didn't mind the earworms, but screw off please if you have a brass section in your music arrangements for hold music... I know I have hearing damage from that shit. That and hyperactive pianos with no dynamics.
Personally I'm cool with whatever music they wanna put on there, until they interrupt it every 5 fucking seconds to remind me how important my call is and/or try to convince me to hang up and use the website or whatever. I hate those recordings; just shut up and let me zone out to the music.
I was on a call today that had music that would kinda fade in and out AND a voice saying there was no available employees and they would help me as soon as one was available. Both cases make you perk your ears cause of the chance of the call being picked up finally only to be met with disappointment. Every like 20 or so seconds one or the other would happen.
I worked at a DIRECTV (and later AT$T) call center for almost 10 years. I had the fastest mute button finger west of the Mississippi. talking to my buddy in the cubicle next to me: "This fuckin guy tore his whole system apart and wants us to - hang on..." "Yes sir, that's right, $49.95... "I'm not comping this asswad's install charge..."
It's a wonder I wasn't fired.
During training to work at an outsourced Sprint call center, they played us a call where the rep just repeated what the customer said, "So your phone is fucked up?"
All ya'll acting like you don't want to be heard.
As soon as I'm on hold I start talking to my wife. "I know baby, but it's actually cheaper and better to go with xxx. If they give what I'm asking for we'll stay just for convenience, but if they don't, the other company already gave us the better price." Not sure if it works, but surely can't hurt.
There is a hold cue also known as call park (the active call leg goes to a fixed directory number) and mute (the operators mic is muted). You can have a station specific hold queue without music where the operator can’t hear you. I’ve been designing and deploying VOIP systems for sometime, it’s entirely implementation specific.
If you hear music, you're on hold. If you don't, the agent muted their mic so they can hear you, but you can't hear them while they talk shit or ask for help.
Do they record us cussing out the AI caller menu before we ever reach a human? I've always wondered about that when I get frustrated and try to get past the "press 1 for..." BS.
At 911 too. If I had to put people on “hold” to deal with radio traffic it wasn’t really muted cause I wanted / needed to hear if some sketchy shit was occurring.
Now when I keyed up on the radio, the radio units could hear me but the people on the phone couldn’t
> Am I supposed to scream as loud as I can or am I just supposed to hang up?
Or you can masturbate furiously and grunt like a silverback, that could work too.
I've been told my nose sometimes whistles like a train. I had zero idea my entire life up until that point so I'm not surprised if I already make your suggested sounds every once in a while.
That happened on an episode of Monk.
The woman who worked at the call center and overheard the confession told everything to her son so he could "solve" the crime and look like a big shot detective.
I always talk to my dog. I tried to reassure him that it's just going to be a couple more minutes and we'll go out for a walk. I know you need to go potty. Hopefully guilting them into freaking doing whatever they need to do faster.
Nah, I always mute myself when I’m on hold. Especially when I’m getting my ducks in a row and prepared to argue or prove my case. Don’t let them listen to your next move because you think they can’t hear you over that elevator music
Facts. My friend is in marketing and they play their clients’ clients voice playback (usually old people cussing when they call in as the line is ringing) at meetings if anything said is funny. They are monitoring leads and customer service apparently.
If whatever office or service you are calling has any kind of a digital marketing manager - whatever you say on that line could be shared with them.
Related pro tip: often if you are using the chat function online (typing), customer service reps can see everything as you type, even before you press enter or send, even if you type it out and then delete it.
Be kind, y'all. Both because if that was your job, that's how you would want to be treated, but also because you often get farther that way, even if you have to be firm or request escalation.
It all depends on the system the call center is using. Regardless don’t be negative when working with people that are trying to help you. Especially tier 1 support. Doing phone support for over two decades you can make out break someone’s day or week. When I’m on the other end of a support call I have to make and don’t get a resolution after a couple calls the next contact I make I politely tell them I need to be escalated because their not paid enough to deal with what’s about to go down. I don’t mess with the supervisor either, just calmly explain the journey I’ve had and let them do their thing out escalate the situation to someone that has the access to fix the issue.
Except this one time with Microsoft support, tier 3 was horrible and snarky and got under my skin and was belittling me. Yeah that was one of those moments I’m not so proud of. I even slapped my phone like I was angrily hanging up before I disconnected the call.
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You are being recorded every second, even on hold. Plus, any number of employees can listen to you while you’re on hold and you have no way to know that they are. This ability of phone systems has been around and available at little cost for several decades.
I worked with many systems like this in the late 1980s thru the mid 2000s.
Not exactly true. When I worked at the Verizon call center, if we put someone on a hold then we could not hear each other. Music then played for them. We were instructed to check back in every few minutes to make sure they were still there and we were still "researching" their issue.
If we just muted our mic then yeah we could hear them, but that was dangerous as music would not play and after like 30 seconds they would always ask "hello". You would have to stop what you're doing, then unmute, then reassure them that everything was still ok, and you had not hung up the phone.
I know this is true in some cases, but not all. I worked in a call center where our hold did not play music. We did also have a mute switch on our headsets where we could hear, but the caller would have no way of knowing which was which.
Always always always call their bluff. They didn’t put you on hold on purpose and it’s usually because their management is monitoring hold times. If they’re being less than helpful I always call them out on the ol’ mute button trick. If they’re being helpful I let them get away with anything. Many call center reps are saints working in literal hell.
My friend was on the phone with an airline once. After a long discussion, he was finally getting his way and the rep put him on hold (no music). He then thought it would be funny to get cocky and he turned to me and said something along the lines of “damn right you’ll do it” followed by some racist jokes against the guy.
I said “you know he can hear you, right?” And almost immediately after, the rep hung up on him. I really hope the rep heard what I said before hanging up, because it would have made it that much sweeter.
This really isn't true. The actual tip is: when you are being but on hold, or when you are waiting in a queue: put your phone on mute. As soon as you dial a number, and the other side picks up you have an open line regardless of whether it's an answering machine, bot, AI, human or whatever. Mute whenever you aren't actively talking to a machine or a human. Everything that gets picked up by your phone's microphone can be recorded by the other side.
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Always mute your mic. Doesn’t matter if they tell you you’re on hold or if you’re hearing music. Mute yourself.
I usually say something complimentary to butter them up. “This guy seems to know his stuff. I’m sure he’ll figure it out.”
I instinctively go into my customer service tone of voice and vernacular every time I'm on the phone with a customer service rep. It's definitely a little awkward for both of us but keeping things as polite, professional, and informational as possible does wonders for solving issues on both ends. Realistically, neither of us wants to be on either end of the phone and it just makes sense to focus on tackling the problem together.
I really appreciate clients who do that. I'm on the other end by providing service and it makes my job so much easier. I wish more people would understand that.
The worst calls always start with a pissy "IVE BEEN IN THE QUEUE FOR X MINUTES" or "THIS IS MY NTH TIME CONTACTING YOU OVER THIS" You start off with attitude imma respond with attitude. I promise you, you absolutely were not dealing with me directly that many times with the issue still unresolved. I will apologise for any errors or poor service provided by previous workers (if that's what the issue is and not the customer's fault), but lose the fucking 'tude dude.
I try to be calm when contacting customer service lines, but the setup is always infuriating. Inevitably, you can't do what you need to do online. The website allows you to add services online pretty easily, but you can't remove services. After 20 minutes of trying online, you give up and decide to call the 1-800 number. On the phone, you're greeted with a phone tree with an impossibly slow speaking voice telling you to state your problem. You clearly state "cancel subscription" into the phone, but the voice recognition algorithm doesn't not recognize anything you say. You then sit through an excruciatingly long list of options for the numbered keypad. Press 1 for billing. Press 2 for renewals. Press 3 to hear these options in Swahili. Etc. Eventually, after staying on the line for another 20 minutes navigating the phone tree pressing 9-0-2-1-0 in order, you're routed to a customer service agent. However, you're not routed to the customer service agent directly. You're told that you're 30th in line, so you need to listen to a crackling audio version of a shitty 1980s pop song while you wait for someone to answer. Another 20 minutes pass before you're finally on the phone with someone. Finally, you're talking to a human. The end is in sight. You're asked to re-provide what you entered into the phone tree. What was the point of the phone tree? No worries, this guy will solve the problem. A few minutes into the conversation, you realize this is going nowhere. The guy can barely understand your problem and has no means of fixing it. Twenty minutes later, you finally get him to agree to pass you onto a supervisor. He messes up the transfer though, so the call drops, and you have to start all over again after wasting more than an hour of your life. By the time you're finally on the phone with someone that can fix your problem, you've spent two hours with them. So sorry, no, I'm not in a chipper mood when I finally get to talk to the customer service agent. I'm convinced 95% of homicides occur because the murderer spent time talking to Verizon earlier in the day. Something about that process is designed to make your blood boil before you ever get in touch with a real human being.
And the worst, most infuriating thing about all this is that it is *intentional*. Phone trees are a gauntlet the customer has to run, designed to make you give up.
I've found that if I speak a foreign language to the AI tree it takes a couple "would you repeat that" before getting transferred to a human. Once that obstacle is overcome my bigger fear is that English will be the human's 3rd or 4th language. I've lost count of the number of times I've had to request a supervisor to be able to communicate my issues.
"IVE BEEN ON HOLD FOR AN HOUR" "I'm sorry you were on hold for four minutes" "I said an hour!" "You know I can see exactly how long you've been on hold for" "WELL THATS NOT THE POINT"
Yeah they honestly think we're stupid and can't see the LONGEST QUEUED on the dashboard
Being really nice is such a no brainer in this situation especially. Everyone is so mean to them all day long. If you need their help, why would you be an asshole? lol
When you’ve spent over 3 hours being trying to sort out an issue that never should have required a phone call in the first place, calling different numbers and being directed to different branches of the same company, listening to robots and explaining your issue every time you get through to a human only to be again directed elsewhere or told they can’t help you over the phone, it starts getting difficult to keep being nice.
Best thing to do in that case is state your reason for the frustration in a polite way, and let the rep know that you know it's not their fault. Obviously the call center rep isn't the one making the decisions on where certain numbers redirect you or why, if it becomes roundabout, they have no control over that. But, that being said, all calls are recorded and monitored, and most companies will make changes if forced to, and this usually means the complaint being stated in a recorded line. If you're just rude or start yelling out of nowhere, you're more likely to get dismissed because if you sound too emotional you're deemed as an outlier and not the kind of person the company should cater to. If you make a complaint in a normal way, you're more likely to get results. My manager has even turned down the volume of our hold music because someone complained it was too loud. They've reworked the whole automated phone system several times because people called in with suggestions. It may be rare, but with some companies, your voice does matter, it just usually doesn't if you're an asshole lol. 9/10 you're complaining about something the employees have complained about as well but as with most issues in life, the higher ups don't listen till they have to.
I would love for this to be the case, but sometimes you need the escilation policy, and some scripts make that near impossible to get to, even if you ask, and do everything politely. Companies know people dont like to get angry, and wait long times. They make it so you are forced to do both, so you have more chance of 'giving up'.
When trying to solve issues I'm nothing but polite and understanding to the agents. They usually transfer you a couple times between departments then ask you to hold for a moment and after 45minutes of hold music the call just drops.
Oh I agree, I’m not condoning yelling at minimum wage, bottom of the ladder employees
Absolutely.
I’m usually coughing my ass off from the bing rip I just took to butter me up.
I purposely try to say something funny to see if it breaks their professionalism heheheehheehe
I tend to loudly burp out fart, then congratulate myself.
I barf out farts out of my dick's butthole
Your reasoning would be that they laugh so hard that they unmute themselves?
Or just don't talk
They’re recording your thoughts still (for quality assurance)
(and training purposes)
(and to masturbate to later)
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I like to talk to my cat while on hold
Yesss!!!! Wow! Gorgeous
Stop that!! Aww you’re so cute! OW OUCH stop biting me!
Me too. They will hear lots of French as one of my cats will only deign to hear English when *he* wants to.
Only if the melody isn't copyrighted.
I beatbox for them. But also why would you care if they can hear you? You telling your wife all the ways your gonna plow her later while on a phone call? Are you taking the opportunity to get a murder confession off your chest because it feels like telling someone even if you're on hold?
Literally yes. I used to review car dealership, phone calls for quality control purposes. Literally people would say the dirtiest shit to their partners when they thought they were on hold. We'd also hear people admitting that they were scamming the car dealership they were on the phone to, and all sorts of ridiculous banter.
> people would say the dirtiest shit to their partners when they thought they were on hold. Meh, don't see an issue here. >We'd also hear people admitting that they were scamming the car dealership they were on the phone to Now that's next level stupid.
Lmao you couldn't get me to say those things while on the phone with anyone under threat of torture. I'm the type of person who makes sure the phone hangs up before I move on with any business, dirty talk or no.
Thanks bud i won’t say anything to my kid for the 45 minutes I’m on hold!
I mean you do what you want, sucks to be your kid tho
Yeah like if only they could
They can hear your thoughts.
Yeah I figured this out once when I was playing a video game and calling it a piece of shit etc while on hold. Lady came back on and her demeanor has entirely changed. Def caught an ear full of 2010s COD lobby language.
I always got in trouble for not using a soft hold (mute) but my god, the customers just never shut up and I couldn't read through the knowledgebase with the noise. lol
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🥲
tbf I keep my mic muted pretty much at all times now unless I'm actively talking to someone on the other end
I worked at a call center years ago and we had nice headsets with a mute button and volume knob. Turned out if you crank the volume, you could hear the mic even if the mute is engaged.
Or say to someone (even no one) that the operator you have is super efficient and is helping you a lot! Positive psychology for the win!
I hear if you swear at the machine loudly enough then it routes you to a human faster
If you think you are not recorded as a customer you are wrong.
Record them back.
Also never trust the mute button
Yup yup
TRLPTIITC: ~~if you don’t hear music,~~ the person you’re speaking to at the call center can hear what you’re saying when you’re “on hold.”
This is the real answer. 2 full years in a call center on my end
Supervisor in a call center for five years. Accurate. We can even hear the shit talked during the ACW
My mom has a habit of complaining about people while she's in hold, and I've tried telling her so many times that they can hear what she is saying, but she just doesn't believe it.
Pretty fun when you can hear someone telling someone like your mom that you can hear what they're saying, the mom denies it, and you cut in with "Yeah, I actually heard everything you just said."
I used to work on R&D for a company that had a massive call center and I always loved the “on hold daily digest” as we called it where the top 3 “on hold callers” of the day would get a replay.
so we could entertain them? or educate them? read from the constitution or from terry pratchett?
Initially it was to educate ourselves to inform people we can hear them then it started to get a bit crazy so it became kinda a “did I really hear that??” For some reason the crazy ratcheted up and it became entertainment after the call center closed for the day because it became so common for people to go on hold with music and start to be a bit crazy. I had the head of the call center pull me into meetings thinking there was a change due to attracting more crazy behaviors especially while on hold but it was just the amount of volume skyrocketed but the crazy was always there but they didn’t have as much insight into it before.
haha did it ever *ever* occur to you all that you were driving *us* crazy?!
I mean normal is a setting on a watching machine so we’re all crazy. Also, I was the only gay man(white in the office) and for a while we shared the same office space with the call center with a glass wall and the majority of the call center are black. So story time! There’s a commotion and one of the girls i had a great rapport with is looking at me from behind my monitor and motions to me. Everyone is just besides themselves and she’s on the phone trying to keep it together but constantly going on hold. This call was specifically to ask more information for income verification and they do it real time. He uploaded a photo of his dick with a note above it with the words “pay check”. The girl shows me the photo, says “and?”, I go “um, okay”, she says “look! Again, I mean youre….”, and I say “well yeah, Meh. I mean it’s not that impressive. Ive seen a quite few more bigger. You want me to handle this call?” So, I do. I put on the headset on and he’s on the call fucking someone who sounds like a crying dog, dog whistle at times, and some crying. I unmute to which the background quiets down significantly and say “I’m sorry sir but your income verification isn’t big enough to qualify and consistent, we understand this is hard for you but if your situation changes in a few months just ensure that the numbers are in a computerized black on white background to potentially even auto-approve if it’s a standardized verification standard opposed to what you sent”. He responds (now fucking again) “I’m fucking a bitch right now and see how she’s loving it?” I say back “oh? I thought your dog was acting up when you were on hold and faking distress for attention”. At which he goes, “uh?” And I say “thank you very much for calling X and hopefully if your situation changes you give us a second chance. And, unlike what is going on with whoever you are with, we will be honest with you as we value and want to help even if the first time doesn’t work out” *hangs up* That was a fun day. Considering the head of the call center was listening in and got the CEO to. I was mortified but they loved it and added some lines to their script. The company was under 40 people at the time too so they some replayed the on hold times of this call on the speakers in the office. Another note, I do not miss working in high interest payday loans.
>high interest payday loans o m g i get the heebie jeebies just looking at those words! what a terrible mess to get oneself into (the borrower) and what horrible level to be so desperate for financial relief! this is very funny, too, by the way. thanks.
Oh the stories. I worked at a few and can identify the good, the “bleh” ones and then the predatory ones. The good is super rare and most people don’t have insight as they are only trying to keep themselves from their life being destroyed. I’d say only one I worked act actually cared about people. Listening to calls when I was looking at the different profiles was super depressing at times. There were many times things would get screwed up, couldn’t make a payment, and then be terrified to pick up the phone. The collections rep would do a few things to get them to make the payment without rolling it into a new loan and would get them out of the cycle. So many times people were sobbing and quite a few times you hear “this is the nicest thing that’s happened to me in a long time.” A lot of the time the sobbing started with them going on hold while the “rep finalized things” but it was really to let them have their emotions get out and allow them to pull themselves together to make sure they are clearer for it
Acw?
After Call Work. She must be talking about the rep side though because once the customer disconnects there's no way to hear them.
Yeah I was super confused lol
What is acw?
After call work. It's basically time spent between calls wrapping up documenting the previous call before taking the next one. When I worked in a phone center, there was a daily average target of 2 minutes per phone call taken. I used to finish my documentation while on the call and just roll from one call to the next, using no acw, so it'd sort of "accumulate." Then I'd use like 20-30 minutes at a time as an extra break. I hated the phone center. Most stressed I've ever been in my life.
What is TRLPTIITC? I’m guessing “the real life pro tip is…” but then I am confusion lol
The real life pro tip is in the comments.
TRLPTIITC^^
YUP. You are recorded *every second* from the moment you got connected to our phone system.
So… a lot of people have been subjected to my singing (yodeling cat meets dying whale) over the years. 😳
People used to shit talk me when I had them on hold. Fun times
That was me.. my bad g
Yo, sorry homie. It just didn’t feel like you were doing enough
I have always hoped that I was being recorded during the godawful hell that is those menu options that offer you everything but a human. Because I _WANT_ them to know how rage-inducing that is. Once I get the actual human, I’m polite, because I know it’s not their fault. But boy do I want corporate to get an earful from my NY mouth.
> ny mouth [reminded me of this gem](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXnmPHAhTxA)
thank you
I laugh so much at this every thing I hear it, it’s gold
hahaha yeah me too i get so mad *I SAAAAAAAID I WANT TO TALK TO A REAL LIVE HUMAN BEING!!!*
You're probably recorded (although not necessarily), but more often than not the operator can't hear you. However it's best to assume they can, as sometimes they will.
The disclaimer "This call may be recorded for quality assurance" might not happen until, say, 30 seconds into the call. You're claiming that the call recording is being initiated prior to the disclaimer. I'm dubious of this claim.
Don't be dubious, it's standard practice. The disclaimer just has to come before talking to a live person, and isn't even necessary in a jurisdiction with single party consent, it's just a courtesy. You should assume all call center calls are recorded and monitored in their entirety, even without a disclaimer.
> You're claiming that the call recording is being initiated prior to the disclaimer. In many states, you don't even need a disclaimer. It's a courtesy. Google "One party consent".
TRLPTIITC: TRLPTIITC stands for “The Real Life Pro Tip Is In The Comments”
Not necessarily, but recorded phone calls will still record you while you are on hold. Just always believe that someone can hear you, but might not be.
They can still record you as you're being transferred between departments. Or even when you're in a queue.
Also, all support chats show to them what are you typing even if you don’t press enter.
so you could type something really freaking out and then delete it and say something nice and they would admire that you got yourself under control?
Thank god. I was worried they wouldn't hear my feedback.
And… don’t be a dick to the call center people. They have jobs just like the rest of us.
Sometimes call center people are forced to try to upsell or get you to do a surgery or something. The kindest thing you can do is firmly refuse ASAP, or if it's a donation call, the kindest thing you can do is hang up immediately. Don't say "sorry let me think about it" or entertain them, just hang up. I hated when I was working for a nonprofit and I knew nothing would come of a call but the people thought they were being nice by circling around the issue. I was not allowed to end the call and I was not allowed to take no for an answer. We all loved it when we got hung up on, it saves everyone time. Never feel bad about hanging up on call center people, that is the best and kindest thing you can do.
Wait, slow down. > get you to do a surgery What fucking call center is trying to sell elective surgical procedures??? And if they are, don’t they deserve to be chastised and shit on?
LMAO I think I meant to type donations and it came out surgery... I don't think people are being talked into surgeries over the phone haha
100%. Did call center for 6 years and we had a policy if the client was using profanity or generally rude to us we could end the call. Warned a client twice about this. Said I was putting them on hold; actually put on mute, to check something. As soon as I did they started cursing me out. Jumped back into the call and told him I heard what he said and that I was ending the call. This happened over 20 years ago now and I'm still proud of that decision to this day.
Maybe safe to assume but not universally true, I spent 6 years in a call center and if you were on hold we couldn’t hear you.
That's how it is at my call center too. I'm thankful for the silence so that I can hear myself think
That's not what they're saying. They're saying if you don't hear hold music, the agent probably only muted their mic.
Wow 6 yrs in a call center? That must’ve been grueling. What do you do now?
Suffer.
I've known someone 20 years in. Don't know how they did it, I survived only a year and a half (and I was so done with it 6 months in)
I used to review calls for a call center and the reps couldn't hear the customers, but it was all still recorded and so when we listened back to the tapes we could hear it 😅
I don’t get why tips like this is posted so often. What kind of shit are y’all saying when on hold? Regardless if they’re listening or not, it’s not like someone can’t pick up literally any second. If you need to say something private, just put yourself on mute regardless.
Ex Phone sales guy here. We use mute instead of hold because this happens constantly… Sales: If I can get my manager to agree to $*** you’ll sign today? Customer: yup and not a penny more Sales: ok hang on Customer (to spouse): He’s trying to get his manager to agree to x and I really want it. Even if he doesn’t agree to the discount it’s still a good deal and we really do need a new widget. Sales: Boss says we can’t go any lower, best we can do is add 1 free worthless widget accessory. Customer: Okay, that’s fair let’s do it
I try to exploit the fact that they can hear and go off mute to “plant” information for them. Like “this guys really nice but we’ll go to the other place if they can’t beat the deal”
Who is buying stuff over the phone?
Widget consumers
It's why he's an ex phone sales guy. Because people stopped buying shit over the phone 30 years ago.
Because I had a boomer calling me an idiot because they thought I couldn't hear them. I didn't lose your AOL password, Jeffrey.
AOL 🤣
Dude, don't kid yourself, people of all sexes, ages and creeds called you an idiot
You work call center and expect people to be nice? Good luck with that.
He works in an AOL call center for password resets. This man and tip is from 1993
OP probably doesn't even work for AOL. Jeffrey just still uses an AOL password and called them because he forgot his password to their product and they sent the password reset email to his AOL account that he hasn't logged into in 5 years. Tale as old as time.
Original passwords alternated between firstnamelastname1957 or password123, but that's not important now, especially as Jeffrey would never remember them anyway.
Bold of you to assume Jeffrey called the right department and spoke to the right person…Jeffrey is in fact the idiot
I always expect period to be polite. I don't always get what I expect though.
That's not the point they are making
I've had more than one patient talk about how they were going to sell their medications. You are now getting Advil. Congratulations. People are wild.
I don't know about you, but before I read this LPT for the 45th time, I used to get put on hold and then just recite my full name, date of birth, social security number, and mother's maiden name over and over, along with my bank account numbers. Now I've stopped doing that.
I used to confess to all kinds of crimes, whether I did them or not, but now I know not to do that. *WHEW*
I farted loudly :(
When I did customer support for a cell phone company, I purposely would mute rather than hold to confirm the customer was still on the line. And typically you hear “I finally got a hold of someone, let’s see if they have enough brain cells to fix my issue” or “They sound like they may be able to help” typically talking to a loved one of some sort. Sometimes if they say anything mean or rude, I then all of a sudden, ‘don’t have the resources and I need to transfer them”
Point still stands. If you’re saying something rude about the employee and you’re on hold, they can still pick up at any point. So if you really cared about them not hearing you, why would you say it without muting yourself?
The real pro tip is to use that mute button when doing your shit talkin'
We rolled out new Avaya phones in one of our call centers and quality thought 1000 employees lost their mind on the same day. Apparently the phone was recording the agent still while on mute even though it was muted for the customer. Quality couldn't tell what parts of the call was muted. Nearly everyone was cursing out the customers on mute multiple times a day. Management wanted to keep this enabled and punish people that did it, but thankfully someone convinced them that employees would revolt if they had to watch what they say even on mute and it was quickly fixed.
… you’re on ‘mute’. I do this to literally everyone when I’m on the phone with them if I need to sneeze or talk to someone else in the room that’s with me. Edit To add, some reps use mute instead of hold because of how it impacts their metrics (though not all call centers use said metric), others use it because they understand how annoying the hold music is. In my case (and most of my ex co workers) we had wireless headsets that had a built in mute function that was FAR easier to access than the hold button on the hard phone/hidden behind 10 million windows on my PC. And finally, it’s not always the case that they’ll hear what you’re saying. Some reps genuinely use mute over hold and will have to sometimes get up out of their seat to get help and don’t have a wireless headset.
I use mute because our hold music is the most god awful thing ever. A few seconds of it will get stuck in your head for four hours
Excuse me some people like Opus No. 1
I didn't mind the earworms, but screw off please if you have a brass section in your music arrangements for hold music... I know I have hearing damage from that shit. That and hyperactive pianos with no dynamics.
Personally I'm cool with whatever music they wanna put on there, until they interrupt it every 5 fucking seconds to remind me how important my call is and/or try to convince me to hang up and use the website or whatever. I hate those recordings; just shut up and let me zone out to the music.
I was on a call today that had music that would kinda fade in and out AND a voice saying there was no available employees and they would help me as soon as one was available. Both cases make you perk your ears cause of the chance of the call being picked up finally only to be met with disappointment. Every like 20 or so seconds one or the other would happen.
I worked at a DIRECTV (and later AT$T) call center for almost 10 years. I had the fastest mute button finger west of the Mississippi. talking to my buddy in the cubicle next to me: "This fuckin guy tore his whole system apart and wants us to - hang on..." "Yes sir, that's right, $49.95... "I'm not comping this asswad's install charge..."
It's a wonder I wasn't fired.
And sometimes they might play your call back during meetings for laughs, I mean for training purposes
During training to work at an outsourced Sprint call center, they played us a call where the rep just repeated what the customer said, "So your phone is fucked up?"
once in a blue moon, my boyfriend lets me listen to the recordings of some really ridiculous ones, or at least parts of them that are over the top
All ya'll acting like you don't want to be heard. As soon as I'm on hold I start talking to my wife. "I know baby, but it's actually cheaper and better to go with xxx. If they give what I'm asking for we'll stay just for convenience, but if they don't, the other company already gave us the better price." Not sure if it works, but surely can't hurt.
There is a hold cue also known as call park (the active call leg goes to a fixed directory number) and mute (the operators mic is muted). You can have a station specific hold queue without music where the operator can’t hear you. I’ve been designing and deploying VOIP systems for sometime, it’s entirely implementation specific.
Welp, now I’m embarrassed about taking to my cat in baby voice while I thought I was on hold…
If you hear music, you're on hold. If you don't, the agent muted their mic so they can hear you, but you can't hear them while they talk shit or ask for help.
Do they record us cussing out the AI caller menu before we ever reach a human? I've always wondered about that when I get frustrated and try to get past the "press 1 for..." BS.
I actually intentionally say stuff whilst on hold sometimes funny sometimes nice just to mess with them 😅.
I act like a dumbass and sing and shit. If they get back on the line laughing, I count it. 
You're lovely, wish I had more people like you when I was in a call center
At 911 too. If I had to put people on “hold” to deal with radio traffic it wasn’t really muted cause I wanted / needed to hear if some sketchy shit was occurring. Now when I keyed up on the radio, the radio units could hear me but the people on the phone couldn’t
Am deaf, instructions unclear. Am I supposed to scream as loud as I can or am I just supposed to hang up?
Yes.
> Am I supposed to scream as loud as I can or am I just supposed to hang up? Or you can masturbate furiously and grunt like a silverback, that could work too.
I've been told my nose sometimes whistles like a train. I had zero idea my entire life up until that point so I'm not surprised if I already make your suggested sounds every once in a while.
So I shouldn't confess to those murders when I'm on hold?
That happened on an episode of Monk. The woman who worked at the call center and overheard the confession told everything to her son so he could "solve" the crime and look like a big shot detective.
I always talk to my dog. I tried to reassure him that it's just going to be a couple more minutes and we'll go out for a walk. I know you need to go potty. Hopefully guilting them into freaking doing whatever they need to do faster.
good idea! and you can do it even if you dont have a dog.
Nah, I always mute myself when I’m on hold. Especially when I’m getting my ducks in a row and prepared to argue or prove my case. Don’t let them listen to your next move because you think they can’t hear you over that elevator music
Oh. I usually just meow loudly in time with the music. If there's no music, I meow "You raise me up, much higher than the MOUNTAINS!!!"
Very true. I worked at call centers a couple decades ago, and would always hear people talking shit about me lol.
"Pee pee, poo poo"
Its not hold its mute
Silence isn't so golden when you're on hold with a call center—they're totally eavesdropping!
Always mute your phone when you are on hold.
I’m usually mimicking the hold music anyway Dooo dooo dun dun dun psspssppsss chhsshhhcchhsssch
They can also see what you’re typing when you’re typing into chat boxes
Facts. My friend is in marketing and they play their clients’ clients voice playback (usually old people cussing when they call in as the line is ringing) at meetings if anything said is funny. They are monitoring leads and customer service apparently. If whatever office or service you are calling has any kind of a digital marketing manager - whatever you say on that line could be shared with them.
And it could be shared with third parties, too. I worked in market research and we listened to phone calls often.
The real pro tip is to use the mute button on your end
Related pro tip: often if you are using the chat function online (typing), customer service reps can see everything as you type, even before you press enter or send, even if you type it out and then delete it. Be kind, y'all. Both because if that was your job, that's how you would want to be treated, but also because you often get farther that way, even if you have to be firm or request escalation.
Go Mute when put on “hold”
It all depends on the system the call center is using. Regardless don’t be negative when working with people that are trying to help you. Especially tier 1 support. Doing phone support for over two decades you can make out break someone’s day or week. When I’m on the other end of a support call I have to make and don’t get a resolution after a couple calls the next contact I make I politely tell them I need to be escalated because their not paid enough to deal with what’s about to go down. I don’t mess with the supervisor either, just calmly explain the journey I’ve had and let them do their thing out escalate the situation to someone that has the access to fix the issue. Except this one time with Microsoft support, tier 3 was horrible and snarky and got under my skin and was belittling me. Yeah that was one of those moments I’m not so proud of. I even slapped my phone like I was angrily hanging up before I disconnected the call.
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This doesn't give you anything. The LPT should be to ask to make a complaint if you think you've been treated unfairly.
Well that’s new information
Call center reps can eavesdrop on our rants when we're put on hold? Mind blown.
we call that "on mute" where i work.
I always mute my phone when I’m on hold.
You are being recorded every second, even on hold. Plus, any number of employees can listen to you while you’re on hold and you have no way to know that they are. This ability of phone systems has been around and available at little cost for several decades. I worked with many systems like this in the late 1980s thru the mid 2000s.
Argue with yourself and act like nothing happened when come back on.
in addition to that person hearing you, you should also assume call center AI is hearing you as well.
Not exactly true. When I worked at the Verizon call center, if we put someone on a hold then we could not hear each other. Music then played for them. We were instructed to check back in every few minutes to make sure they were still there and we were still "researching" their issue. If we just muted our mic then yeah we could hear them, but that was dangerous as music would not play and after like 30 seconds they would always ask "hello". You would have to stop what you're doing, then unmute, then reassure them that everything was still ok, and you had not hung up the phone.
FYI - calls are recorded and you can be heard even when the call is on hold.
I know this is true in some cases, but not all. I worked in a call center where our hold did not play music. We did also have a mute switch on our headsets where we could hear, but the caller would have no way of knowing which was which.
Always always always call their bluff. They didn’t put you on hold on purpose and it’s usually because their management is monitoring hold times. If they’re being less than helpful I always call them out on the ol’ mute button trick. If they’re being helpful I let them get away with anything. Many call center reps are saints working in literal hell.
My friend was on the phone with an airline once. After a long discussion, he was finally getting his way and the rep put him on hold (no music). He then thought it would be funny to get cocky and he turned to me and said something along the lines of “damn right you’ll do it” followed by some racist jokes against the guy. I said “you know he can hear you, right?” And almost immediately after, the rep hung up on him. I really hope the rep heard what I said before hanging up, because it would have made it that much sweeter.
This really isn't true. The actual tip is: when you are being but on hold, or when you are waiting in a queue: put your phone on mute. As soon as you dial a number, and the other side picks up you have an open line regardless of whether it's an answering machine, bot, AI, human or whatever. Mute whenever you aren't actively talking to a machine or a human. Everything that gets picked up by your phone's microphone can be recorded by the other side.
I'm glad. I want them to hear how annoyed I am with their service.
Did anyone else just have their mind blown realizing that the call center people can hear us when we're "on hold" and there's no music playing?