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ellasue posted:I missed the old thread but was wondering if anyone could recommend any books/resources on how to deal with angry customers, specifically in a call center environment. I'm up for a Tier 2-like promotion and, while I'm confident in my knowledge, I don't have much experience with call control and/or people who are irate. I sometimes end up at the end of an escalation process when it starts getting technical, out of hand, no one knows what the gently caress or its a key customer. 1) You'll actually be cut a bit of slack because you're not front-line. Sure the angry customer isn't all sweetness and light but because they have got you instead of the front line guy I find they are far more willing to listen to what you have to say and accept what you tell them because in their mind you're more likely to know what you're doing. 2) You say you're confident in your knowledge, as long as that comes through it will be a massive help combined with number 1. So you've got a good start. 3) These phrases make everything better. a) I'm going to personally deal with your issue and ensure X, Y and Z happen. My name is X and my direct line is Y or you can email me at Z. b) Ok, I get what your saying and I agree that is unacceptable (or I agree with you we need to do something to sort this etc) lets see what we can do to make things right. What can we do now that would resolve this? 4) Make sure you get a clear overview of what the gently caress is going on as early as you can, especially from whoever passes you the call, and then from the customer, then repeat it back to them. "ahh right Mr X I get it, we did this, which meant you did that and now its all gone tits up because of such and such". I dunno why but doing that seems to calm really irate people down, they get it off their chest and by repeating it back to them (obviously using your own words not parrot style) they can see you actually understand whats up rather than just saying "I understand" off some script, by the time you've done that they seem much calmer and more willing to work to sort it, maybe its just a few seconds to cool off etc.
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Jan 14, 2011 17:48
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Fil5000 posted:Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly with point 4. Paraphrasing what the customer's said and feeding it right back to them does wonders because they feel like you really get it. Never heard it myself, but then I tend to deal with people either at work in a similar corporate hell, in full knowledge their calls are recorded or wannabe captains of industry who have no time for such frivolity. I have had someone sing, "Boring boring boring, Cast_no_shadow, this is loving boring" down the phone while reading a legally mandated statement to them.
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Jan 15, 2011 01:57
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Ancient billing systems  Almost everything in the company I work for is run from a program we bought somewhere between 1982 and 1986. Command prompt everything and incredibly counter-intuitive (well for anyone who has used computers in the last 20 years). That said, I love it. It works, its fast, and its bullshit free. Out of everything we use, not matter how many millions it cost. It works best, once you learn the ins and outs of it its like reading the matrix, it just all makes sense and 10x faster than anything they'd put together today.
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Jan 28, 2011 22:04
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fret logic posted:I love that trick too, gently threatening the customer with some vague bs that scares the hell out of them is great for getting them to listen to what you're trying to say. This was after a 10 minute round and round: "No, I can't give you back the channels you've had for a year that you haven't been paying for and have not been on your account. I wont charge you retroactively for the service you werent supposed to receive, but I can go ahead and add it to your account if you'd like that service back." Haha I love that trick as well. When I listen in to some of the account managers calls at our place they are always using it and it never fails to make me laugh. The account managers have a certain amount of leeway to give discounts to corporate schemes, although this leeway is based on each schemes profitability, so some we'll bend over backwards for, others we'd be quite happy never to do business with again. When the second type call up looking for us to change something or do them a deal "OR THEY'LL CANCEL" its always great to hear the account manager check into their details, see they are basically draining us of money anyway and say "so what date do you want your scheme to end?" nine times out of ten they get "erm..uhhh...I'll call you back".
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Feb 10, 2011 12:45
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Well I just got offered a new job. You know the guy up in corporate that makes the final decisions on complaints etc, that's going to be me. No idea what the regulatory system in the US is but over here financial services (investment banking apart) is heavily regulated and customers, individual or business, have a set route of complaint. You complain to the company, they have a chance to sort it, if you're not happy you go to the ombudsman and if he agrees that you've been hard done by the company gets hammered by fines. Thankfully our company isn't one that bends over backwards and as long as the guys on the front line do everything right we turn down more complaints than we uphold, and do a proper investigation rather than just agreeing to avoid the hassle. I'm looking forward to it, and especially looking forward to sticking up for the little guy on the phones  It also means I'll spend my day looking and working on things that could probably all end up in here!
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Feb 11, 2011 18:27
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Good time to be a man though. As long as you are not married\share expenses with a woman. Or are planning to retire within the next 20 years.
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Mar 2, 2011 21:20
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As far as I've seen you're approaching the issue a little backwards. It generally works along lines like. People with X trait over the last X amount of time have crashed\claimed 30% less than people with Y trait. So they lower that premium to pinch those kinds of people from other insurers. Other insurers catch wind of it and do the same. Someone not actuarial notices and comes up with reasons, ie. it must be because X means people are more Z and thus better drivers. The actual pricing makes no comment on why X or Y means someone is less likely to crash\claim, just that it does (assuming they didn't gently caress up and they are using a decent sample).
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Mar 8, 2011 19:38
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My contracted working time is 42.5 hours a week. Boy how I would love to do that in 1 go and then have the rest of the week off.
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Mar 22, 2011 19:08
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Stress toys? Pen lids. My desk is a veritable graveyard of mangled pen lids.
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Apr 5, 2011 22:13
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JackRabbitStorm posted:Mondays are my day off, my day to do homework. I just got scheduled to do a noon to midnight because of expected call volume. What gets me about this, is with a bit of thought its really really easy to do rotas. With the amount of bitching I heard about them, from both sides of the fence when I had to cover a month holiday and write out the rotas I was expecting a nightmare. However, some logical thinking and half an hour with excel and you can work with even the most difficult schedules and know well in advance if you have a problem, or even might have a problem if you have any sickness\holiday. The fact so many managers can't do it, well, its just pure laziness\ incompetence. It also makes me mad.
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Apr 17, 2011 17:29
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Loving Life Partner posted:Hahaha, I hate the "NAME RANK SERIAL NUMBER" people. 100000x better than, "No, whats your date of birth?" "Why should I answer that?"
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Jun 2, 2011 17:46
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Aerofallosov posted:I am now an accessory to breaking federal law. AWESOME. All because some assclarinet wouldn't have her daughter unlock her account. Oh no, mommy's gonna lie. Then as I start to hang the phone up, I hear "(Accountholder)! What do you want your password to be!?" Exactly what the guy above me said. I'm sure even the most insane love the customer call centre wouldn't be harsh on you for making them go in branch. Even the most basic of manager understands, unhappy customers cost the company money and makes upper management mad at them, however, fraud, regulatory fines and bad publicity costs the company gently caress tons of money (in comparison) and makes senior management even more mad at them. That, and depending on the law in your area, they might be just as culpable as you.
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Jun 28, 2011 18:22
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When I have to cover a phones shift I do feel sorry for our guys. Policy Information system, email client 1, email client 2 (not joking here), policy notepad 1, policy notepad 2, policy notepad 3 (yeah, copy and paste notes 3 times so all parts of the business can see them), quotes engine, 2 or three browser windows showing various information, policy owner checker, Utility spreadsheet, word & pdf viewer for documents, call management system. Thats all I can remember off the top of my head, could so easily be cut down as well which makes it more frustrating when it causes ancient pcs to die.
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Jul 29, 2011 17:28
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That conference/mute trick is genius, can't believe I never thought of it when I was stuck in phone hell.
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Sep 2, 2011 14:25
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Bovril Delight posted:This poo poo will absolutely get you fired for call avoidance and is easy as gently caress to track, fyi. I'm miles away from call centre work these days (Thank god). I do admire the creativity that goes into these things though.
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Sep 3, 2011 11:06
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Fil5000 posted:My pet hate used to be getting referrals from staff who would start by saying "I've got a customer on the phone..." I KNOW you have. We work in a call centre. Do not tell me you have a customer on the line, this should be a normal state of affairs. Sometimes I think it would be nice if they just rang for a chat.
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Sep 10, 2011 15:38
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We have several note systems for various things, because hey, who needs one bit of software when you can have 12. Anyway, a word I type a lot is discount. When you type really quickly its easy to miss spell words. I re-read my notes from a year or so ago on an account. "12% Discocunt"
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Sep 14, 2011 19:10
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Slightly off topic, but do you guys have redundancy payments in america?
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Oct 13, 2011 01:35
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Wow the more I read about employment in the USA in this and the retail thread, the more I feel for you guys. (FYI - (in the uk) Redundancy payments are paid if the company lay you off, I think the legal minimum is like 1 weeks pay per year worked or something, most companies that are not poo poo pay more, I get 2 weeks per year works to a max of like a years pay or so. If they offer voluntary redundancy, they sometimes up it a bit as well). Anyway to contribute, I have an answering machine on my phone, stop leaving your life story. If I'm so busy I didn't have time to get to your call, it probably means I don't have 5 minutes to listen to whatever inane bullshit you decide to leave on my messages. It's nice your marketing director has had a baby, good for him\her, but could you please get to the point, give me some details or a number or something instead of telling me how hes a loving beautiful baby, I honestly don't give anywhere near enough of a poo poo, this is a loving answering phone message not a conversation. I speak to you like once a year. Also, messages that go. "hi Cast_No_Shadow, its steve, ring me back". Now on my mobile\cell\in my personal life, thats fine, becuase I probably know you. On my work machine, do you have any idea how many Steve's there are? Yeah ok maybe I spoke to you last week, do you know how many people I speak to in a week? Do you know what happens if I search for a member named Steve in the policies I look after? The loving system will crumble because the results would be in the 5 figures. Don't you dare ring me back another day complaining that I never answer your messages.
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Oct 13, 2011 13:32
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legsarerequired posted:Nope, no it doesn't. Folks who just want to scream usually just tell me "Well, obviously YOU can't help me" or "I DUNNO, WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO TO FIX THIS?!" 1) Let them vent for few. 2) "Ok I see, right, what do you need me to do to fix this?" Worked fine for me back in the day for a few times I couldn't actually understand what the gently caress they wanted. Most of the time when some one is venting its pretty clear why, especially once you've worked somewhere a while its always the same few things that crop up. So you can either sort it or you can't, In which case its, "ok so you need document X, do you want me to email, fax or post it you" or "Sorry nothing I can do there, if you want to complain, heres how you get in touch with our complaints department"
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Oct 20, 2011 16:09
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It's posts like the one above that make me so glad I work in a different building in our complex than the call centres these days. The fact you need a special pass to get into both each building and each office in the building is good too, I'd say only about 20~ people can actually get into my office (not including cleaners\senior management). Also, apparently, the women's toilets in our building are revolting. Of those 20 people, maybe 5 are guys, our toilets are always spotless, a pleasure to visit. Seriously, I live in a rather lax shared house, the toilets at work are nicer than the ones at home. But the horror stories I hear about the women's makes me gag. I don't get it. Its very blatantly one of about 18 people (one of the 15 from our office or one of the 3 lawyers that works in the office across the hall), you'd think given the risk of people finding out its you, you're the one that apparently shits so violently it lifts you off the seat like some kind of faecal rocket and sprays you around the room like a deflating balloon would give cause for thought. But no.
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Oct 28, 2011 10:59
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How is that not illegal. I know you have protected classes in America, ie. they cant sack you because they find out you're gay or black or whatever. Although we all know they'd just say its because you're not productive or whatever to get around it. But this appears to be clearly documented. 1) I was in hospital in an emergency situation. 2) I was in a car accident. So if they then go, get out don't come back, surely they can't do that? I mean they aint even pretending its because of some bullshit reason just to sack you... Is it really that hosed?
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Nov 6, 2011 13:08
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Loving Life Partner posted:I'm considering buying an ad at the superbowl to try and dispel the myth that insurance rates go down every 6 months. I can't believe how loving embedded this thought is into everyone's god damned brain. This 1000 times this. I work in medical insurance, not in a call centre any more, but still have to speak to people here and there and by god. 1) If you claim, and its big potatoes, your premium will go up. You all seem to understand this for car insurance but not medical? You crash your car your premium goes up. You get cancer and claim 100k against a 2k premium? Yeah its going to go up....how do you not get this? (Note - I live in the UK, medical insurance is purely a luxury so you don't have to wait\mix with the poors like when you get your free government treatment). 2) Medicine and the people who give you medicine are not cheap. Have you checked out how much a heart surgeon\anesthesiologist charge these days? How about that fancy new micro-key-hole surgery thingy? Those new cancer drugs? Constantly going up way above inflation, thus premiums go up. 3) When you get older you are more likely to claim. Thus your premium goes up. When you live in London your hospitals charge out the rectum, thus you pay more in premiums compared to your brother who lives in Wales. You also get to use those world famous specialist hospitals on your doorstep. As an aside though, I was working through the rating algorithms we use for pricing up risk, whoever wrote them back in the mid 90's put in a little warning when certain factors are pricing at what was considered insane pricing, like a little "poo poo something might have broke" flag so someone could check it out. Now 80% of the quotes we do have one of these flags. Prices go the gently caress up! Oh and the profit margin on a customer? While I can't really say exactly, you have no idea how low it is, really we ain't screwing you, it really is that expensive to make people better, the only reason we make any money is because of how many people we insure, this ain't some sick bad make it rain on them hoes business. Cast_No_Shadow fucked around with this message at 15:59 on Nov 16, 2011 |
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Nov 16, 2011 15:56
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Dear Business Owner, You are not a profitable policy. We don't care. If your policy has cost us X and you pay us Y and if X is greater than Y, having you as a customer costs us money. If its pretty close, generally we don't mind, I mean, chances are you wont break everything two years running, if however X is £30,000 or more greater than Y, well we could have employed a person to sit around at home and chronically masturbate and would be in a better situation. Threats to take your business elsewhere are like threats to buy me a present. If you really want to make us feel bad, threaten to never leave.
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Nov 17, 2011 14:42
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Go through your line manager\sup\team leader\whatever. More likely to get the outcome you want, less like to get peoples backs up.
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Dec 1, 2011 15:32
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Yeah there is certainly a point in the corporate hierarchy where below it hard work gets you nothing good. If you are able to smash it out every day and destroy the rest of the departments targets\productivity figures unless you're specifically being incentivised for that and don't really care about promotion there is literally no good reason to do it. If you want to be bumped up, 'good' job performance is enough, and if you consider opportunity cost, actually pushing yourself at your defined job is a net loss. You should be charting in the top x% of your team consistently, but you should also be looking for ways to demonstrate clearly skills that are not necessarily related to your job but are valued in higher positions, and you should use the spare time you have from not killing yourself to do double the amount of work of the next best person to do so. Its a lovely game, but we all have to play it.
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Feb 16, 2012 12:33
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Probably not, most people that say that don't cancel. I used to work in a job where people would threaten that all the time. When the business is unprofitable for us, it always gave me great pleasure to respond with "no problem, is that from today?" and watch them backtrack.
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May 8, 2012 17:32
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To be the best call rep ever in the eyes of the customer you don't actually need to do much. Just be not poo poo. They expect you to be dumb, slow, wrong and unable to help them. Do better than that in just one and they'll be impressed. *People who are just pricks in general are not included in this observation, you could actually be Jesus answering the phones and both heal them and forgive their sins as an added bonus as well as fixing their internet or whatever and they'd still cuss you out.
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May 21, 2012 17:57
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Our loving phone software. I don't normally log in anymore to take calls but jesus gently caress if it isn't the worst. Today I had to log in for a few hours to collect a few stats and check up on a few things. Obviously, there ain't no way in hell I'm setting myself to ready because I ain't taking no calls. Clearly the demon software had other ideas, decided I was clearly slacking or some poo poo and started routeing them through to me anyway. Who the hell thought that was a good idea. On the small plus side, at least I was in a position to give no fucks about metrics, surveys or even complaints, so that was liberating. Is it me though or have people become even bigger dicks than a few years back?
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May 29, 2012 17:45
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For a while some guy in one of our IT support departments got in on the Jesus thing. Him - "Ok Sir I've just remapped that for you and everything should be working fine, can I close the ticket?" Me - "Sure, thanks buddy" Him - "By the way, have you heard about Jesus?"
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Sep 21, 2012 09:18
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taremva posted:Ace Job gently caress me thats a nice job for a call centre. There is one good bit of advice though, if your stuck in call centre land, find one that services business to business, a million times less customer bullshit than those that look after Joe Bumblefuck public.
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Oct 25, 2012 12:08
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taremva posted:Just found out that I'll be working 24-26th of december, 12 hour days. That would be one of he poo poo parts of this job if you have a family. It is usually possible to take out (paid) vacation though. I always forget things like this are seen as ace perks in America, I know its preaching the choir here but, for all its faults I love that we have a statutory minimum for Paid time off of what 28 days? a year, pro rated if your less than full time.
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Oct 25, 2012 15:46
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You will feel despondant within the hour. Youll feel sick thinking about getting up and going to work within the week. You will contemplate either suicide or murder (depending on your personaility) within the month. Eventually you will go numb. If youre lucky.
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Oct 2, 2014 17:01
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