Please hold the line
It seems as though I have spent most of the morning on hold with little to show for it. I started thinking about the annoyance of being made to wait and realized I have strong opinions about it. I also realized that wait state takes very different forms, some of which are more annoying than others.
By far the most annoying is the one with background music that is interrupted about every 20 seconds with a message like “We appreciate your patience. Your call will be answered in the order in which it was received.” After about 20 of those, I am ready to scream.
Today when I tried to call my local bank, I encountered a maze of choices, that would always result in my being on hold with some sort of background noise and then just as I thought I was being connected to MY BANK, would connect me to someone in Scranton or Wichita or some other city other than to my bank which is less than a mile from my house. ARGHHH!
The next holding pattern was one of absolute silence. In this case, it is impossible to know if you have been disconnected or if you are really on hold. And it is so maddening that you continue to hang up and redial, simply to encounter a new voice and once again be placed on hold while that person tries to answer the question that no one has been able to answer.
The only on hold situation that seems to give me any measure of contentment is one in which I am flooded with high quality classical music, like Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. I settle in and hope the person doesn’t come back until Spring or Fall or whatever season is over. What a difference!
I’m sure there have been studies of this, since putting someone on hold seems to be the norm these days, as if answering the phone and talking admits to not having enough business or too much free time.
My husband has resolved this by using his speaker phone to alert him when the human returns or picks up, thereby allowing him to multi-task. Not all of us are so technologically savvy or willing.
How does being put “on hold” affect you?
posted by Barbara at 12:24 PM
11 Comments:
It's really difficult to have a good "hold" experience. Even when I'm hearing quality music it's tinny and flat, coming as it is over a phone line. (Or cell tower.) But I agree with you -- that's better than those messages about "the order in which it was received," which are enough to drive anyone bonkers.
It's absurd that you can't call your local bank branch. Makes me want to go back to about 1960, before anyone thought of calling in an "efficiency expert."
I just hope that when those machines are telling me that I'm important to them that there is no-one listening, cause after a length of time I start talking (ok read swearing!) back at them. And one day I'll get caught I'm sure
Most of the UK call centres are now in India and the staff work to a script, so heaven help you if you want an unusual question answered!
xx
I surf the web or read while on hold. I only half listen to the peppy muzak or recorded message --just to be aware when the human comes on the line. I can put the phone down and still hear what's going on--but speaker phone is a good idea too!
I love when they give the estimated wait time. That's the best.
I hate being on hold, then they pick up and "accidentally" disconnect me. That would be the absolute worst.
Scranton is better than India...trust me.
David has the answer with the speaker phone. I have done that sometimes but not often enough! I am so afraid to hang up for fear I will be out of the queue and have to "sign" up again for the waiting period, that I hang on and hang on......The speaker is definitely in my future permanently!
Also...... if this was happening and the bank were a mile a way I would get my butt over to the bank pronto!
I do not do well on hold.
Steve -- The advancement of technology is both a blessing and a curse. Some days I long for 1960 when we had rotary dial phones and real people answered them!
Fire Byrd -- I would imagine more profanity has been uttered while on hold than anyone could ever imagine. Just today I found myself letting off steam (the 4-letter kind) to the poor bank clerk in Scranton who finally picked up my call.
Squirrel -- I still have a hard time multi-tasking while I am on hold. I also have trouble reading while on the Metro, for fear I will miss my stop.
Velvet -- I do like those cases where they tell you up front how long it will be. I'm always amazed when their estimate is fairly accurate. It makes me wonder how in the world they are able to compute the number of minutes before they know how long the other people ahead of me are going to talk.
Kate -- I did go over to my neighborhood bank, where I substituted one holding pattern for another. I waited for almost an hour to talk to one of the many foreign clerks who had about a 5th grade level of reading and writing. It was actually painful to complete the transaction. I'm holding my breath as to whether the foreign wire transfer I was attempting will actually happen.
While waiting I had a great conversation with a young Jamaican man named Peter, who claimed he had been there for about 5 hours and was out of patience. We talked about the way he had traded in his slow way of life in Jamaica for the hurried pace here in the US.
Bulletholes -- I don't think you are alone. No one likes being on hold!
I have found here in the UK if you don't answer the first question "if you have a touch phone please press the star button now" you will be put through immediately. This would tell them that you have one of those old fashioned dial phones and somehow they wish to speak to those customers urgently. Works most times.
I just keep pushing 0 until a "real" voice answers, then I ask them to hold a minute as I need to recover from the shock
Lusks -- For the first time yesterday I encountered one place that was going to cut me off if I didn't push a button. I guess they have no use for customers with rotary dial phones!
Pauline -- I tried the "0" trick to no avail yesterday. Some of them have gotten clever, forcing you to listen to all the options and providing another number or no number at all for a human voice.
The speaker phone is the only way for me to go while on hold.
Oh, I miss the ring of a good old-fashioned rotary phone! If I were queen, "ring tones" that pretend to be something other than a telephone would be abolished, and violators would be issued noise pollution and culture degradation citations. And, despite all the advantages of the more modern technology, the sound quality was generally better on the old phones. Both my partner and I have to limit the time we can spend on phones these days, because most people use a cell or wireless phone, and in most cases the sound fidelity is very harsh on sensitive ears...
Back to carrier pigeons?
F.
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