Dear Customer Service: Thoughts While on Hold

Dear Customer Service:

In the amount of time I have spent on hold with you, I could have invented the Internet, or at least learned how to use it for social networking.

Here are some things I would like you to know:

"Your call is very important to us."

Really? Cool!

Redundant questions

Please don't have your electronic voice ask a lot of questions your live representative is just going to repeat.

I don't want to press the pound key or any other key

Please allow me to respond verbally to your electronic questions in case I'm riding my bike.

Muzak arghhh

Do you have any idea how annoying it is to be held captive to your music while on hold?

Once I called a company—maybe Apple (R.I.P. Steve Jobs)—-and the electronic voice offered a no-music option. Imagine my delight!

Then sadly, by the time I fumbled to my keypad, I lost the opportunity for a noise-free wait.

So please offer a no-music option for while I'm on hold BUT give me plenty of time to respond, verbally as mentioned above.

How long will I be kept on hold?

If I must be kept on hold, please let me know the expected wait time. Thus, I can decide whether I have time to feed the dog, read a novel, write a novel, or only enough time, say, to floss.

Create Jobs by Greeting Each Caller With a Representative Instead of a Labyrinth of Recorded Menus

With the good will of having a real person answer the phone, you will draw new customers.

Say you are Verizon. You could advertise on TV, showing the disgruntled Comcast customer on hold and, on a split screen, a happy Verizon customer connecting right away to a smiling representative.

News media will pick up the story of this new way of answering customer service calls, and your bottom line will explode with black ink.

"Have a nice day"

If you really want me to have a nice day, please do not tell me to have a nice day.

Whether or not you tell me to have a nice day, let it be understood that I will do my best to have a nice day. I do not want to waste time hearing pleasantries and then feel I ought to mimic them back, when all I want to do is return to eating my avocado sandwich.

"Thank you" is more than sufficient and more likely to lead to my having a nice day than someone telling me, "Have a nice day."

Customer satisfaction surveys

And puh-leeze, (oxymoron alert) no customer satisfaction surveys. Is there anyone who actually presses 1 for "I want to take a customer satisfaction survey after my call?"

Press # for more options; press * to hang up

Are you kidding? You're kidding, right?

Please let me know, because I could really do without the anxiety I experience when I hang up, as I always do, without pressing the * key. Sorry, but I've always had a rebellious streak.

Following up with a customer satisfaction phone call

Worse yet, pretty puh-leeeze, do NOT have some disembodied Barbie voice call me at some point to ask if I'm satisfied with your service. Even if I had been satisfied, I am now utterly dissatisfied that you disturbed my thoughts while I was in the middle of writing.

Before you phoned, my dog Casey had been all snuggy beside me in a sleeping furball and now he's dancing around, making toenail sounds on the wooden floor and barking and all agitated. If you ever call me again unsolicited, I will take my business elsewhere!

Wow, I guess that last one struck a chord. I hope you get the message.

Your frustrated customer,

Susan

I would love to hear your customer service experiences in the comments below.

Tweet, Facebook, Share! Help get the word out, so customer service will hear and actually become CUSTOMER SERVICE!