To think when people call a call centre theres no need to scream and shout!

[pennygirl26]

I work in a call centre and people are very abusive and scream and shout. Do they actually think this is going to get them anywhere?

I work in a call centre.

It's not often people are rude to me because I genuinely try to help. Unfortunately I'm not allowed to help as much as I'd like. I have to abide by rules to escalate and I am told to do at least 10 calls an hour. Great except one person might take 15 mins to sort.

One of the first posters was absolutely correct. Nobody cares about anything except how many calls I did. It doesn't matter if I resolved anything or not or how I spoke to anyone or not. It's all about how many calls.

This is why the exceptionally rude cow I have the utter misfortune of sitting next to keeps her job. She gets through more calls than me because she rushes it, hangs up on people and fobs them off (so they end up calling back anyway) because nobody cares enough to find out how come she gets through so many calls. Were just told to take more calls.

What was really dehumanising for me was that call times were logged but also break times and walk always and I would be presented with my 'stats' every month.

I used to come home mentally exhausted from 10 hour shifts of constant talking and listening. And a the time you are racing against the clock to get your call times down.

I do have a lot of sympathy for the OP, and for those who work in call centres and receive such vile abuse from callers. That is not acceptable.

That said though, I have to admit that I find some call centres incredibly frustrating. I recently needed a PAC code from T-Mobile to port my 15 year old daughter's number to another network. I spent an hour on the phone to them one evening before having to give up because dinner was nearly ready. I decided to try again the following afternoon when I got back from work. Two and a half hours later and I was still hanging on. The call was never answered. Frustration barely describes it. More like I must have had steam coming out of my ears.

Eventually I gave up with that department. I went through a different menu system to a sales support department. Funnily enough the call was answered relatively quickly then (or maybe I am just a sad old cynic these days). I gritted my teeth and managed to explain succinctly (and without swearing or name calling) what had been happening, how poor the service was and that if they could not organise a PAC code for me immediately I would lodge a formal complaint to OFCOM. They gave me the code.

There is no need to be threatening and abusive to call centre workers. They are doing a job. They work the system, but did not create it. Perhaps some of them are as frustrated by it as I am. I do not condone the personal abuse at all. It isn't an intelligent way to pursue your case. However, experience does lead me to understand the frustration that can lead to it.

I work in business to business customer services, so not the same scale as a public call centre, but still deal with some total wankers. I am amazed how useful having training with toddlers is when it comes to dealing with people who just scream and demand the unreasonable. Stay calm, repeat ad infinitum 'no I'm sorry I can't do that, we never agreed to that, shouting won't help, if you continue to do so I'll have to terminate this call' (although I've never found a successful equivalent to hanging up on a toddler)...

(Ahem)

If you call the number and then pound the hash key some systems will put you straight through to a call handler.

I work for a tv phone and bb company and alot of the calls are so abusive for no reason and i think if they were speaking face to face most of these people would never be like this.

I hope it's not TalkTalk! In my (fairly extensive!) experience, their customer service is truly awful on the phone. We switched providers eventually, because we were fed up of the way they treated us as customers.

I am never abusive to call centre staff, because ultimately they are just doing their jobs and they are entitled to be treated with basic respect. However, I do tell them when I am disappointed with their attitude or with the standard of service. I also make a point of telling them if they have been helpful.

Unfortunately, the standard of customer service in call centres is frequently very poor and the staff often seem very badly trained. Even if they don't actually give a shit about serving the customers, it would be nice if they could at least pretend. I don't condone it, but I do understand why people get the rage!

Did she get you mixed up with The Samaritans?
Sorry Lists - I missed this post from you last night.
The lady in question was highly upset and anxious after arriving home to find her energy supply cut off after having her property forcefully entered with a warrant. It had gone way way too far and she should have sorted it in the first instance of an issue but didn't for various reasons.
Her mental health was questionable from what she was saying to me and yes often, the job was a bit Samaritan. So a lot of the call was trying to get her to be calm enough so I could explain her options. She was graphic in the way she described what she would do so when she cut the call and wouldn't answer my call backs I knew I couldn't just leave it.

Mummy
I find it quite funny to be called thick, stupid, uneducated etc... For the more specialised area's within call centres that I'm qualified for I can earn 18 - 22,000 PA. Not bad for someone who sits on their arse all day

Yes, Yes to whoever said it's mentally draining - it is so much.
Taking upwards of 80 calls per shift, having to go in depth through customer expenditure in order to reset defaulted payment plans, sometimes speaking to outside depts on customers behalf and often to get them some bloody help - local councils, social services and even Macmillan teams for customers terminally ill.
Sick and elderly customers who have no family and physically can't get out to pay bills nor know how to set up D/Ds so we have to attempt to talk them through it in order to maintain their energy supply. Speaking to mentally disabled people who do live on their own but have no clue how to read meters or stay on top of paying bills (and who have Social workers for this reason but are often left to fend for themselves, I once spent 1 hour calming and reassuring a man with such issues that he was not and would not go to prison because he had missed payments - he was utterly inconsolable :( it still upsets me today to think about)

Also taking calls from grieving families calling through - which is all part of the job and one that I'm good at and happily do then you get some arse hole on shouting and screaming because THEY have fucked up their payment plan for the 20th time this year and we won't reset it, while in the background they shout across the room
'Pass my iphone love, so I can give this bitch my number or pass the sky remote so I can turn it down to hear what this stupid cow is saying''
I shit you not and they're on the phone wanting me to reset their d/d for the least amount possible because they can't afford to pay. :)

Snapes With you regarding TT.

There's absolutely NOTHING wrong in telling an advisor you're not happy with a service, attitude or whatever. In fact if it's a 'company' issue many advisor's WELCOME the complaints and will happily get them logged (to hopefully get through to the Company that things need to change because they don't listen to their staff)
With a lot of companies you don't even need to ask - We listen for a sign of dissatisfaction from the customer and we're in there :) offering to raise an issue officially on your behalf. Sometimes it might not make it as an actual complaint if it's something minor but more of a 'heads up' for management.

With regards to TT, I'm just glad that they were so incompetent over the phone that we never actually got as far as having their service installed!

Been there three years in zero tolerance reception and 18 months at nhs direct and 111 .I think of a nice place and just smile through the sewage 😂

I agree people shouldn't be abusing people in call centres. However over the years I've had various problems with companies that have involved multiple conversations with call centres. And usually I am only making so many calls because the previous staff member told me they were doing something and didn't. Sometimes they have literally pretended to do it on the phone! 'OK, that's all done for you now. Anything else I can help with...'. So while I would never shout or scream at someone, I have sometimes called up very angry. I usually try and be sympathetic to the person answering in that I know it's not their fault personally. But honestly, when you've already had multiple people lie to you, it's hard not to be angry.

And let's not forget the 5 minutes of absolute wind up listening to various messages and pushing different numbers to get you through to the right queue where it will always say 'we are experiencing a high volume of calls rights now....' and then give you some god awful hold music. I got fucking Celine dion once! None of that is setting you up to be in a good mood is it?!

Zombie thread from 2014 🤔

I work public facing so I understand how awful it can be. But I lost it on a call to Talk Talk! Their customer services is shocking. I had received completely incorrect bills and they took it direct debit from my account on a date that was completely different to my direct debit date.
The lady who I struggled to understand to begin with as she had a very thick accent, and I do think the call centre was overseas kept repeating herself 'Ma'am, you must listen to me and understand me. Do you agree that you will understand me?' She wouldn't accept that the script she was reading from wasn't the problem that I had. It was awful. I cancelled my contract with them.

i worked in a call centre for the local council and although loads of people were nice I do remember we a few bad ones.

when people started screaming and shouting, I would turn the volume on my headset down so at least I could hear any points they made but not have to put up with the nonsense.

To be honest, I very rarely put up with Annie rudeness. there was a man and I could see from the system that a social worker had to help his partner and children escape him and he was shouting about how he was going to kill himself if the social worker didn't bring them back (presumably for him to continue to abuse them) and I ended up just saying that there must've been a problem on the line because he wouldn't let me speak and was talking over me so he must have not known I was speaking.

Someone once wanted to complain that I wasn't able to confirm if they could eat the mushrooms they had picked in a field that didn't even belong to the council. they started to say I was going to be reported to the local newspaper…. So I put them through to the newspaper.

I really can’t believe how many posters on here are making excuses for bad behaviour and admitting to having been someone who has abused a call handler. If you’re so unbalanced that you allow yourself to have a tantrum or meltdown then you need to get some help. We’ve all been frustrated at times and we all have issues but we don’t all act like massive c*s when we don’t get our own way.

I work as a call handler in a council. I am very good at customer service, but I still have customers who straight out of the gate start yelling and don’t let you get a word in

these customers are very few….but I think those posters on here who have decided that if someone yells at you then its a sign that you aren’t doing your job properly need to rethink

Oh god really

fucks sake MNHQ!

This.

It is impossible to get any problems sorted out on a call, and I have often been driven to distraction.

The answer is not to shout though, you have to ask to be passed onto their line manager - keep asking until you can speak to someone who can sort things out.

I work in the finance department of a fairly niche sector, that's a small to medium enterprise. What I do in the company is pretty limited, but we're a small office and I work with colleagues who do really technical/specialised stuff.

I have a direct dial landline and a mobile number. I always tell customers "call me in my working hours. If it goes to VM, send me a text or email and if I'm here I'll call straight back. If it's something I can't help with,we'll find someone who can".

The amoubt of emails our general inbox gets from customers who are blown away by this is unreal. People have given up hope that, for a business, a direct number where you call and AN ACTUAL HUMAN BEING answers even exist.

Call centers by their nature are foul and dehumanising. I had to call 999 last year and I know, they think they have very important questions that need asked but there is no scope, for the human calling to give informaiton that overrides that. I was getting told to put my batre hands in the blooody wound of a man who used IV drugs and was stabbed.

If people are abusive to call center staff, it is because call centers bring out the very, very worst in human beings becuase of how vile they are.

Same, we all get cross and frustrated once in a while, but it’s not acceptable to take it on call handlers. I had a very difficult situation last year, but didn’t get cross, just after half an hour of being completely misunderstood and with contracting information, I just said: “I’m going to have to leave this call now as I am getting upset, thank you anyway.” Then had a big angry cry!