It wasn’t my fault!!

The technical aspects of this story will take some explaining for the average non-computer geeks in the audience. However, having had my wife tell me more than once “I know you’re speaking English, because I recognize some of the little words in between, but I have no idea what you just said,” I will try to keep the techno-babble to a minimum. Once I get to the “meat” of this story, you will see WHY this was something that I broke which was very important.  I was working as a Customer Service Technician for a major computer company. The company for which I actually worked was a wholly owned subsidiary of the parent company, so I didn’t actually work FOR the Big Company (hereafter known as “BC”), but my supervisors, support and training were all through the Big Company. If this is not clear, never mind. It actually has little to do with what I broke. Then again.

Now the BC had a contract to repair, replace and maintain Point of Sale computers (aka: computerized cash registers) for a very large retailer we shall refer to as Big Box Mart (hereafter known as “BBM”). Part of this included upgrading the individual store’s network from a token-ring network to an Ethernet network.

A token ring network was quite the feline’s nightwear when it came out. You could run several terminals off of one hub, and have them all happily communicating like geese in flight. However, as with most technology, it had its drawbacks. If one goose, for example, was removed from the flock, the whole flock shut down. This could be a problem for the remainder of the geese, who want to keep going but can’t without the one that needs attention. With Ethernet, the vet could see the one goose while the remainder continued to make money- er, I mean on their flight south.

BBM is a very centrally controlled organization. All decisions, down to thermostat settings, are (or were at this time) approved by BBM Command Central in (ah now-that’d be telling you what organization BBM actually IS! Mom & Dad raised big kids, not stupid ones.) So when BBM Command Central decreed that this switch should be accomplished during the day, and not just during the day but at Noon, that was, as they say, that! This particular store was large enough to have two token-ring hubs. That way we could take half of the store off-line while the other terminals continued to working. This was the theory, anyway.

So here I was at the store, preparing to follow the instructions as prepared and sent out from BBM CC. There was no senior representative present from BC because they were all doing other stores, but it all appeared fairly straightforward. Remember, however, what they say about appearances. I coordinated with the local stores bicycle assembler / store tech support and proceeded to disable the first hub. Suddenly, we had several blue-smocked supervisors running in saying the front registers had all stopped working- at Noon. Apparently this store had the main switches for the individual hubs reversed from other stores, so that by carefully following the instructions from BBM CC and with no senior partner from BC with whom to confer, I effectively disabled this store in the middle of the shopping day. Had one of the senior representatives been present, they were aware of the switch-but they were all doing other stores. This can be a terrifying experience, unless one keeps one’s head. I simply re-enabled the front hub, which meant that the registers- I mean “terminals”- just had to go through their first-opening routine again. The store was down for less than 15 minutes-barely enough time for BBM CC to notice and call to ask why they weren’t receiving data.

I expected repercussions from this, but none were forthcoming. The store continued to trust my expertise, even as I installed the majority of the new terminals. Halfway through the job, BBM received permission to build a newer, even LARGER BBM on land across the alley from this one. Why did they put new equipment into a building they were vacating? Don’t ask me-ask BBM CC.

Where do I sign up?

Bush Officials Urge Swift Action on Rescue Powers
NYTimes.com

Bush seeks $700B for debt bailout
CNN

Economists: Financial bailout necessary
MSNBC

“People who go broke in a big way never miss any meals. It is the poor jerk who is shy half a slug who must tighten his belt. ” The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

Where were all of these helpful people two years ago when we needed a bailout?  We are classic “victims”, if that is the correct word, of the Mortgage Mess.

We had a nice house.  It wasn’t showy or very big, but it was ours.  Well, MOSTLY ours.  To quote a song by the late, great Jerry Reed “That me and the finance company own”.  “Owned” is the correct verb. 

Like (m)any other chump(s) in the late 90’s I tried to keep it as nice as possible, while enhancing the resale value.  New siding and windows came first.  It was really first-rate viny siding, and very good double-paned windows.  The contractor even knew a banker looking to make this kind of home improvement 2nd mortgage loan.  The plan was we were to get the work done, and then she was supposed to help us get a new mortgage at a lower rate for the whole amount.  That was the plan.  However:

“The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men,
Gang aft agley,
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!
(The best laid schemes of Mice and Men
oft go awry,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!)   Robert Burns, To a Mouse (Poem, November, 1785)

Next there were the termites they discovered while replacing the patio door. I’d never seen a termite before, but there was little doubt in my mind what those stupid little white ants were. Hello, exterminator.

After the loan went through and the work was done, I couldn’t find the loan officer. The offices where they had been were empty. This was not a fly-by-night operation. This was a real bank and a banker of some standing in the community.

So anyway there we are with a nice looking house and two mortgages. We should have sold it then, without the loan officer, but this was at a time when the local military base was undergoing a downsizing, with the major unit moving to Europe. Schools built to accommodate the families of soldiers and support personnel were closed, and houses didn’t move in that market. By 1993, we had filed bankruptcy.

After The Floods of 1993, the ground started moving at an accelerated rate. We escaped the water, but the false-stability of the ground was disturbed. First the foundation cracked. If you are unfamiliar with Kansas geology and building practices, imagine if you will houses built on the old flood plain of a river, down stream from the dam constructed to control the flooding but outside of the levees. “Geology” actually implies rock. “Sandy Clay” is a better description. Houses built upon slabs of concrete on land that calling it “unstable” is a gross misnomer. Water line breaks were routine, and to find a house without a cracked foundation and wonky walls was a rarity.

It got so bad we could see light coming in beneath the south wall in the master bedroom. The floors were like a rolling plain beneath the carpeting from all of the cracks. So another mortgage was necessary to get at least the south end of the house lifted. Then part of the ceiling started to collapse because of all the foundation movement.

My wife started talking about gasoline and matches. I started hoping for a tornado- less suspicious. They had discovered a small geologic fault running beneath the dam by this time, and everyone had earthquake insurance added onto their policy. I tried to convince my agent to consider that it all MAY have started with a small earthquake, but he thought I was kidding.

We had to wait until after 2000 to get his done, until the bankruptcy had been completely discharged, but eventually

we got the one end of the house done. I thought it was odd that the mortgage officer that we went through kept adding onto our income until it “fit”, but he assured me that this was a common practice, coming to an “average” income level for our area.

So once again we limped along for several years, in hopes of getting yet another refinancing to fix the other end of the house. I should have looked skyward for inspiration – I might have seen the leaks in the roof. Another refinance, only not for what we had planned. THIS guy told me he knew of an appraiser that “if he didn’t see it, it wasn’t real” so he urged me to smooth out and/or otherwise cover up the undulating floors. That way the house would appraise for more and we could get more of a mortgage. We got a nice chunk of change, but not enough to do the rest of the foundation as well.

Finally we felt we were in a position to finish the foundation work. Someone started building multi-story houses along a nearby street, and property values skyrocketed. We thought with the increase in value we might finally be able to get the foundation done and sell this house. We were in the process of preparing for this when we discovered that the termites had not really left. No the hungry little… devils had come up behind a book shelf we had on the eastern wall, making many of our books hors d’oeuvres before proceeding on to the main structure. We couldn’t even interest anyone in the house as a potential “flip” with this combination of problems. We couldn’t afford it, we couldn’t fix it and we couldn’t even sell it. So we lost it.

One would think I should have been suspicious of all of these clowns and their machinations, and on one level I suppose I was. But I kept thinking eventually we’d sell the house, and everything would work out.

So why am I asking about OUR bailout? What excuse do these financiers have? They hoped it would continue for ever, and everyone would wind up happy, rich and comfortable. The minute things got tough for them, they start crying for the government to help them. Nobody rode to our aid. We received no such compassion & understanding from them. I read about loan officers from these companies living in their cars and losing their condos, some living in their cars, and I say “wah!”

One mortgage company referred us to a debt assistance company. We had submitted all of our information to this outfit and they had sent it to them. So what did it accomplish? When I called to see what we could work out, they hadn’t even opened the packet. The representative had no idea what I was talking about, and just continued to demand payment.

Bailout?  Don’t those building have windows?  Feel free.

The People at the Other End of the Phone

It has taken me a while to get around to writing this post, which is OK, because I understand now more what actually happened. However, I’ll let the incident speak for itself.

I monitor call volume at a telephone customer service center. I won’t mention the name of the company for which I work, nor will I mention the name of the client. I feel this would be a breach of professional etiquette, if not in violation of some paranoid agreement they probably will I insist I signed of my own free will in the wee small hours of a wintry morning after an evenings’ revelry. They shall be hereafter referred to as the Company and the Client.

The Client has very strict ideas about the number of agents that they want “on the phones” at any given time. I have come to believe that they divine these numbers using a Ouija board and fish entrails, but however the get them, that’s what they expect. There are multiple centers, so someone has to keep track of how many agents there are through ALL of them to see how we measure up against the predicted number.

The Company is in the business of running call centers. They have the experience to know how many agents are necessary. Those of us that have worked for the Company for longer than a day or two have seen all manner of calls wander down the wire, and all manner of unforeseen incidents that can affect the number of calls received by any call center on any given day. It’s frequently feast or famine- either we’re up to our butts in alligators or we’re organizing Canasta tournaments.

One weekend the Company, in league with some upper to middle range representatives of the Client, decided to show those with decision making power within the Client that these numbers were unrealistic. So it was decreed that we would have NO MORE agents answering calls at all centers than the number provided by the Client’s bean counters. For example, if the predicted number of agents needed for a particular half-hour period was 150, we could have no more than that number taking calls at ALL centers. This called for co-ordination between centers on an unprecedented scale. It also meant that no matter HOW many calls we had waiting, if we had MORE than 150 people “on the phones”, we had to take them off an have them do training or attend team meetings or clean the center or organize a Canasta tournament.

The problem was that we frequently had as many as 200+ people in the queue waiting to be served, JUST at the call center where I worked. Those calls were left unanswered. Too bad, but a point had to be made. It was very confusing, let me tell you.

However, it left me wondering. What about all of those people at the other end of the phone, who called in expecting “customer service?” WHERE was the customer service in this exercise? How many customers were sacrificed to this little spat?

More Call Center Life

Thank you for calling Acme Cell Phone Customer Service, my name is Marah, may I have the cell phone number you are calling about?

I don’t know the number.

Sir, I can’t help you if I don’t know the number we’re dealing with.

I can give you the last four numbers of my Social Security number.

I’m sorry, sir, but that’s still not sufficient.

That’s OK `cause I just want to cancel the service.

I can’t do that either, sir, without knowing the number.

That’s why I want to cancel–customer service here stinks!!!!!

————————————————————
Thank you for calling Acme Cell Phone Customer Service, my name is Marah, may I have the cell phone number you are calling about?

555-555-5555

OK how may I help you??

My calls have been dropping the last couple of days.

I see from your account you live in an area that is currently experienceing a hurricane.  Have you considered the weather as a factor?

Why is it Fox Mulder can be buried in Arizona in a box car full of dead aliens, yet he can connect to Scully in Washington, D.C.  but you can’t guarantee me service in this over-grown thunderstorm?

————————————————————
Thank you for calling Acme Computer Customer Service, my name is Ishmael, how may I assist you?

Yeah this brand new computer is broken and I wanna refund.

OK may I have the serial number?  ########################  I see, sir, that he unit you have purchased is actually one of our refurbished models.  Would you like the number to technical support for that model?

What do you mean “refurbished?”

It’s a model that was returned to us for whatever reason, and our tech support personnel check it out, make sure that it’s in operational condition, and then is offered for sale through discount outlets.  May I ask where you purchased this computer?

Dewey Taykum’s Pawn Shop in the Bronx.

That’s not one of our approved outlets, sir. (Pause) Sir??

That stupid (edited) clown told me it was brand new!!  I’m gonna take this back there and (edited)!!  (MUCH more editing!)

Is there anything else I can do for you sir?

Yeah- watch for me on the evening news!!! (CLICK)

————————————————————
Thank you for calling Acme Computer Technical Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I assist you?

My computer won’t do anything.  It just sits there with the light flashing at the top of the screen.

What were you doing when this problem started, sir?

Well, my cousin told me that if I removed programs from my computer it would run faster, so I removed them all.

Excuse me?

Yeah, he told me about this command called “fdisk”, so I ran it and now my computer just sits there.

So you removed all of the files and programs from your computer?

Yeah.

And now it doesn’t work?

Yeah.

And now you want to know why?

Yeah.
————————————————————
Thank you for calling Acme Computer Technical Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I assist you?

Like, this computer is totally fried, man.

In what way, ma’am?

(Sound of tapping, as on a desk to or a mirror, followed by a long inhalation) The keys on the keyboard keep moving around, and I can’t ever seem to find my files where I left them.

Uh-huh.

And the display, like wow, man how do you guys get it to do that? (More tapping/inhalation) Oh wow that’s wild.

CallCenter Life III

This one is based upon a call I made TO Customer Service:

Thank you for calling Acme National Trash Services, how may I help you??

My trash was not picked up.

OK. Let me look at your account.  I see that your bill is past due, and services were cut off.

Yes, and whether I’m an air head for having missed the payment is still under review, but I also recieved a letter from your company today (the 7thday of the month) stating that the were willing to work with me as I was a “valued customer.”

Yes, sir that letter was mailed out on the 1st.  We cut off your services on the 2nd.

So you mailed a letter to me on the 1st promising to work with me, and I don’t receive it until the 7th.  There is no way I COULD have received this letter by the 2nd, and yet that is when you cut off my services.

Yes sir, that’s the policy.

Young lady, I hope this call is monitored.  Not because you have done anything wrong, but so your managers can listen to how stupid what they just made you say sounds.

NOTE:  I have since changed trash companies.   The old one has yet to come pick up their container.  If it’s here much longer I’m going to sell it at a yard sale.

—————————————

Thank you for calling Blah Technical Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I help you?

I’m having trouble connecting to the Internet.

Who is you service provider??

Internet Explorer.

No, I mean who did you contact to connect your computer to the Internet?  Do you use AOL?  CompuServe?  A local ISP?

You mean I have to call someone else to connect?  You sold me this computer, YOU should make it connect for me!

————————————————

Thank you for calling Blah Technical Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I help you?

Every time I try to dial into the Internet, I get an error that says “No Dial Tone.”

Are you sure that telephone line is active?

Yes, we’re speaking on it. 

How many phone lines do you have in the house?

Just this one.

Is someone else using the phone when you get these errors?

Yes- what difference does that–OH!!

———————————————

Call Center Life II

Having received encouragement from an independent source (thanks, Rich McLafferty http://richmclafferty.wordpress.com/ ) I shall continue:

Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I help you?

Yeah, like, I stole this computer, but it ’s password protected. Can you help me?

—————————————————–

Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I help you?

My computer is laughing at me.

Excuse me?

Every once in a while, I hear laughter from inside of the box.

O…K,  What exactly does the laughing sound like?

You don;t believe me, do you? 

That’s not the point, ma’am I’m trying to determine what may be causing the sound that you hear.

IT’S LAUGHING AT ME!!  I SUPPOSE YOU ALL ARE HAVING A GREAT TIME WATCHING ME TRY TO DO THINGS ON MY COMPUTER AND MAYBE IT’S YOU I HEAR LAUGHING!!  I want it stopped!!!!!

—————————————————–

Thank you for calling ABC Cell Phone Customer Service, how may I help you?

I want to dispute part of my bill.

May I have your phone number, please?  (pause)  I’m looking at our bill, which part do you want to dispute?

It appears that there are over $400 in text messaging charges that I didn’t make or authorize. 

They were made from a phone on this account.

Well, yes, they were made by my children, but I don’t think I should be responsible for them since I didn’t make them. 

(On mute) The messages or the children??

—————————————————–

Call Center Attendance Line, are you going to be absent or tardy?

Female Employee:  I’m sick and won’t be in today. 

(Child’s voice in the background of the call) Mommy are we going to Wal-Mart yet?

CLICK!!  (Obviously going to get medicine)

—————————————————–

Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support, my name is Ishmael, how may I help you?

My girlfriend threw my computer off off the balcony in my apartment. 

That’s not covered under your warranty, sir.

I figured that, but is it covered under my Accident Protection Insurance?

____________________________________________________

Thank you for calling Blah Customer Service, my name is Ishmael, how may I help you?

I want to return my computer for a refund.

When did you purchase the computer?

Spring of 1995.

Sir, that’s over 10 years ago.

So?  it came with lifetime support, they can’t help me fix it, so I want my $2400 back.

___________________________________________________

That oughta be enough for now.

Common Sense VS. Quality Assurance

(See Rich McLafferty’s on my blogroll for this posts inspiration.)  Once again, the nail has been roundly struck headwise by Rich McLafferty.  Quality Assurance is supposed to guarantee the CUSTOMER has a quality experience.  You remember them- those funny people on the other end of the phone??

 I remember a call where the customer knew she had the wrong department; she just wanted to be transferred. Great call- nice & short. I failed the QA because I didn’t hit all of the required phrases, and because I didn’t upsell. Fortunately my supervisor at the time not only had common sense but also had also monitored that particular call, and was able to immediately appeal and correct the score.

I’ve seen QA agents go back out onto the floor, only to be terminated because they were worthless as CSR’s. They could talk the talk but not walk the walk. At least now where I work, QA agents are required to take a certain amount of calls per month.

Common sense would correct many of the issues I see in call center life. A cell phone client requiring 300 agents to be available on Christmas Day has no bearing on logic. (However, the center did get a good cleaning that season.) A computer manufacturer requiring a sale on every call leads to unnecessary, incorrect or incompatible parts being sold and shipped by Customer Service agents who really don’t know anything about computers. Otherwise, a customer would not have been sold a memory upgrade for their portable computer and received RAM for a desktop.

And even before I got into call centers, there was a newspaper that began to push the readers as “customers”, and hired writing coaches. One of the reporters sniffed “If they can’t understand my writing, they need to go back to school.”  You will note that “dead tree” newspapers that ignore this precept are now in decline.

Call center life

This post is actually an expansion on the theme of a comment I left at http://richmclafferty.wordpress.com/2008/08/10/metrics-schmetrics/

Oh hallelujah!! Finally someone with a common-sense approach to CSR performance. I find myself slowly inching up from the floor within the call center evolutionary chain, currently working in the operations section of a call center in Kansas. I currently work with Volume Management and Log-In Ordering, but have done Work Force Management. Most of my call experience is with inbound computer/ISP issues, except for a brief stint in an out-bound telemarketing facility (that period is like my brother the lawyer- my family still loved me in spite of it.)

Well I recall the double-edged sword of Customer Service: AHT (Average Handle Time) and FCR (First Call Resolution). These were mantras drilled into our heads by increasingly flustered managers. Service Level Management (SLM) desk always ringing your phone or sending Roamers out to see if you needed help. Don’t bother to ask for help- the answer is in your resources. Never mind arguing the illogic of this oxymoron- you’d probably get written up for insubordination, although I doubt if any of them could even properly define the word.

Moving to Tech Support offered some relief. They STILL wanted it, but understood better that each problem was unique. Glory be for wrong numbers and hang-ups– they could help keep your AHT down.

There were posters around telling you to be prepared to provide your Billable Utilization (BU) on demand of a member of management, with a simple quadratic equation on how to determine this metric.

The newest client we have is a major cell-phone service provider. They’ve been stressing service over handle time, but recently I’ve seen disturbing references to BU creeping into the literature. The company for which I work is already having issues with burnout and retention. I was happy to get off the floor when I did, even if it meant creating schedules for the entire center – in Excel.

No one ever really took the Customer Satisfaction surveys seriously, which I felt as a mistake. Certainly, they were a pain to compile, but WAS THE CUSTOMER SATISFIED should have been the determining factor over handle time. I listened to others taking calls and finishing them in record time- by giving out inaccurate information.

 I was proud of the fact that I NEVER scored perfect on a Quality Analysis. I was more concerned with making certain the customer got what they needed, if it as within my power and abilities, over whether I used the correct phrasing. 

The next time you call  Customer Service or Tech Support, and the person seems in a rush to get you off of the phone or absolutely flustered, perhaps now you’ll understand a little better.  A common response to the threat “I’ll have your job!” from a caller was “You couldn’t do my job!”,  hopefully said with the Mute button depressed.

 

 

 

I oughta write a book

I need to get some of the… silly things I’ve heard in my years working in call centers compiled somewhere.  I think I’ll start a NEW category!!

“Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support this is Ishmael, how can I held you?” 

“My computer won’t turn on.” 

“OK what model of computer do you have?” 

“White.”

                                                                                                          

“Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support this is Ishmael, how can I held you?”

  “You’re going to laugh at me.” 

“Ma’am, I’ve been at this a while and I’ve heard a lot, so it’s unlikely I’ll laugh at you.” 

“OK, well, I have a laptop that I use for work.  Recently I took a train trip, and didn’t want to take the laptop along with me, but I don’t live in a very good part of town.  So I asked the local police for advice, and they told me the best places to hide things in an apartment where theives are unlikely to look.” 

“Uh-huh.”

“When I got back from my trip it was late and I was hungry, so I decided to fix myself some biscuits and turned on my oven.  But when the kitchen filled with smoke, I remembered WHERE I had hidden my laptop!”

“I’m sorry , ma’am, but you’re right – I have to laugh at you.”

“I undersand.”  (A brief pause ensued.)  “What I really need to know is will my Accidental Damage insurance cover this?”

                                                                                                          

Upset customer:  “I’ll bet you’re mother was a whore!!!”

Ishmael:  “No, sir, if she had been I think I would have gotten better presents as a kid.”

                                                                                                          

Ishmael:  “No, sir, I did not say YOU were stupid.   I said what you just told me was the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

                                                                                                          

“Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support this is Ishmael, how can I held you?”

“There are sparks and smoke coming from my monitor.”

“Sir, I recommend you turn the system off immediately!”

“But I’m not finished with my paper!!”

                                                                                                          

“Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support this is Ishmael, how can I held you?”

“We just got this computer for Christmas, and as I was setting it up, a screen came up and said ‘Press any key to continue’.  I didn’t want to do anything without calling you guys first.”  (And he never did ask WHERE the ‘Any’ key was!)

                                                                                                          

“Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support this is Ishmael, how can I held you?”

“My computer won’t turn on at all.”

“Have you made sure it’s securely plugged into the wall or power strip?”

“Just a minute, I need to get a flashlight- the electricity has been knocked out by a storm here.”

                                                                                                                                                              

“Thank you for calling Blah Tech Support this is Ishmael, how can I held you?”

(Adolescent Male Voice)  “I installed a new video card into my Dad’s new computer, and now it doesn’t work, so I need help removing and restoring the computer.”

“Did you see the paper seal on the case that said breaking this seal would void your warranty when you opened it ?”

“Yeah- what does that mean?”

“It means even if I could help with the installation or removal of third-party hardware, I can’t help you, and any other problems your Dad has with the computer are no longer covered under his warranty, because you broke that seal.”

(CLICK!)

                                                                                                           

As I remember more, or hear more from my colleagues, I’ll add them.  I guarantee that I did NOT make any of these up.  Several of them are based upon calls I ACTUALLY took.