A multiplicity of things
Sep. 24th, 2011 06:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
plonqI really thought this would happen in a more dramatic, or at least more heroic fashion. I figured I would hit maximum level while turning in a pile of murloc eyeballs, or escorting an irritatingly slow-moving NPC who I'd rather shiv than save. Instead I dinged 85 while sitting on the wind rider, picking my nose while I flew to the next quest hub.
In other news, I just got off the phone with Sears (again). When they delivered our new washer and dryer on Thursday, they gave us the wrong dryer. We ordered a matching pair of high-efficiency appliances, but when we went down to hook them up later in the evening we discovered that the dryer was not part of the set. Worse, the one that they gave us is several models down from the one we paid for.
When I called it in on Thursday, the girl at their customer centre promised to put in a call for a replacement and said that we would hear back from them no later than today. She also said that we were free to use the dryer we had until the replacement could be delivered. When we had not received a call from them by 17:00, I called them again to make sure we had not been forgotten in the system.
After spending close to ten minutes listening to hold music, I got connected to one of the more surreal call centre experiences I've had in awhile. The line clicked, and I heard people talking in the background. It became obvious to me that somebody's headset was sitting on the desk, and my first thought was, "Oh great, somebody went on break and forgot to log out of their phone."
About thirty seconds later somebody brusquely picked up the headset and there was a great deal of rustling as they put it on. After about 10 more seconds of silence, there was a long-suffering sigh at the other end and a girl tersely said, "Sir, could you please look at the phone number on the card in front of you and tell me which number you think you called?"
I hesitated for a moment and then read the number off to her.
"That's our number," she replied angrily. "but who did you think you were calling?"
"...Sears?" I ventured. Suddenly a light went on. "You know," I said, "I don't think you're talking to who you think you are talking to."
We quickly figured out that the person who had been on the phone had obviously hung up on her when she had put down her headset for a few moments, and I'd been patched through in his place. She almost burst into tears when she realized I wasn't the same person, as much from embarrassment as relief. Apparently this guy had been a real piece of work.
I confirmed that they were going to be sending us a replacement dryer (she double-checked that they had put through the order) and she reassured us that we were welcome to use the wrong one in the mean time since they did not expect us to just live with dirty clothes until a new one could be arranged.
In other other news,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
atara and I planted ourselves in front of her computer and watched Season 2, Episode 2 of MLP:FIM. They set the bar pretty high in the first season, and I was a little worried that the second season might not live up to it. If these first two episodes are any indication then my worries were unfounded. I hope Hasbro sells warehouses full of MLP toys so that they keep making these for a while.
Also Twilight Sparkle is the mostest awesomest pony ever. She was my favourite even before this S2E2, but this just gelled it for me.
I would say more, but some of you probably haven't seen it yet and I don't want to let any spoilers slip through.
In other news, I just got off the phone with Sears (again). When they delivered our new washer and dryer on Thursday, they gave us the wrong dryer. We ordered a matching pair of high-efficiency appliances, but when we went down to hook them up later in the evening we discovered that the dryer was not part of the set. Worse, the one that they gave us is several models down from the one we paid for.
When I called it in on Thursday, the girl at their customer centre promised to put in a call for a replacement and said that we would hear back from them no later than today. She also said that we were free to use the dryer we had until the replacement could be delivered. When we had not received a call from them by 17:00, I called them again to make sure we had not been forgotten in the system.
After spending close to ten minutes listening to hold music, I got connected to one of the more surreal call centre experiences I've had in awhile. The line clicked, and I heard people talking in the background. It became obvious to me that somebody's headset was sitting on the desk, and my first thought was, "Oh great, somebody went on break and forgot to log out of their phone."
About thirty seconds later somebody brusquely picked up the headset and there was a great deal of rustling as they put it on. After about 10 more seconds of silence, there was a long-suffering sigh at the other end and a girl tersely said, "Sir, could you please look at the phone number on the card in front of you and tell me which number you think you called?"
I hesitated for a moment and then read the number off to her.
"That's our number," she replied angrily. "but who did you think you were calling?"
"...Sears?" I ventured. Suddenly a light went on. "You know," I said, "I don't think you're talking to who you think you are talking to."
We quickly figured out that the person who had been on the phone had obviously hung up on her when she had put down her headset for a few moments, and I'd been patched through in his place. She almost burst into tears when she realized I wasn't the same person, as much from embarrassment as relief. Apparently this guy had been a real piece of work.
I confirmed that they were going to be sending us a replacement dryer (she double-checked that they had put through the order) and she reassured us that we were welcome to use the wrong one in the mean time since they did not expect us to just live with dirty clothes until a new one could be arranged.
In other other news,
atara and I planted ourselves in front of her computer and watched Season 2, Episode 2 of MLP:FIM. They set the bar pretty high in the first season, and I was a little worried that the second season might not live up to it. If these first two episodes are any indication then my worries were unfounded. I hope Hasbro sells warehouses full of MLP toys so that they keep making these for a while.Also Twilight Sparkle is the mostest awesomest pony ever. She was my favourite even before this S2E2, but this just gelled it for me.
I would say more, but some of you probably haven't seen it yet and I don't want to let any spoilers slip through.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-09-25 05:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-25 02:15 pm (UTC)At the call-centre side, it is frustrating when you know exactly what the customer needs, and what you need to do to fix it, but you're locked into a script and can't help them because of it. From the caller side, it is annoying to have your only avenue for help be a call centre where their policy is geared more toward keeping calls short than in actually helping you. I would be willing to bet the really irate ones are not first-time callers.
When I had to call Linksys about a defective router, I wanted to throttle the girl at the other end of the phone by the end of the first hour of the call. I kept myself calm by reminding myself that she was just doing her job, and in the larger scheme of things she was doing it as well and as professionally as she could - even if that meant she did three full passes through a script that did nothing to address the problem I was calling about.
At the end of the call I politely thanked her for her time, and then returned the router to the store and swapped it for a D-Link, vowing never to buy another Linksys product. I guess in that sense the call centre really did do some good.