Anyone work in customer service?

[SparklyJadeFawn]

I work in a customer service and admin role.

A lot of the job Is answering customer calls.

Honestly the abuse I get.

They shout scream swear at me. One of them called me stupid before I'd even said anything!

If I tell them that what they're asking for simply can't be done in the timeframe they want, they demand to have it now. Then call me useless etc.

Why are people so aggressive?

Is anyone else here dealing with customers?

Totally unrealistic. And it's not possible

Booking.com don't answer queries on the same day. They take days to get back to you.

So will you not be using them again then?

I've never used booking,com in my life, and have no intentions of doing so. I don't even live in the UK, maybe your overpopulated island has something to do with the apparent lack of good customer service provided. 😅

Don't mention the overpopulation or your post will be deleted

@Jumpingthruhoops I agree with all of your post
"
-The fact the first port of call for a lot of people now is an AI 'chat bot'?
-And I say 'first' but this probably isn't the first time a customer has tried getting this particular query dealt with.
-Your call/email is finally directed to an 'agent'... who you eventually get through to after being on hold for nearly an hour (Sky, I'm looking at you!).
-When you do eventually manage to talk to a human, there's still, very often, a 'computer says no' approach.
-On top of all that, these queries usually have to be dealt with mid-week when people are at work, adding to any stress that might have been there to begin with.

There's never an excuse for abuse, death threats. BUT I can totally see why people might be thoroughly pissed off by the time they actually get to talk to someone."

It's certainly not the individual agent who deserves the abuse but any query I know I have, I literally have to take a morning or afternoon off work to sort. I'm not rude or nasty but by the time I get through to a person, sometimes I'm ready to throw my computer across the room. It's SO arrogant of these companies to expect the general public to put up with such appalling service. Most of them just need to stop taking huge dividends and get more staff out there to answer the phones.
Martin Lewis is monitoring this at the moment-I hope customer service gets regulated at some point and companies are fined for inconveniencing their customers and the cost of their time waiting to get through.
I really feel for elderly people who struggle with technology - my mum can end up in tears and she's computer literate for her age (84).
Thank you to all the staff who do actually help at the other end of the phone - you deserve a medal.

If we had that, we would have involved the police. I would refer to management and they would report. All calls were recorded. I'm sure they would think twice about saying it to someone else after receiving a visit from the police about making bomb threats.

A lot of the problems arise because staff don't listen to customers either. Probably because of the poorly drafted scripts and lack of training - they just have their framework and can't work outside it.

In particular, the problem comes when they don't do what they are meant to, or it's too hard and they just leave it, and don't escalate it to someone who CAN deal with it. The number of times for example that you see newspaper articles about problems with meters and the wrong meter reference number which causes massive bills for people. It really can't be that hard to sort out, but there's no will in the utility companies to do it - because they have to speak to their opposite number in another utility company - unless Which? or a newspaper gets involved.

It's like on here, you see a different side to people when it either involves anonymous posting, facebook comments or customer service. People take all their frustrations out. It's awful, especially as a lot in customer service are young and in their first jobs

Also someone mentioned that you can see who the customer is from the account number/telephone number they put in/are calling from.

So why do people then ask for all the details all over again?

Why not say Good morning Mrs Parkrun. Can you confirm the first line of your address for me/second digit of your PIN or whatever, and get on with the call? But no you have to give all your details all over again. Such A Waste Of Time.

See, when companies put profit over genuinely good customer service people will be angry. 10 call handlers to answer thousands of calls a day is awful management of the system. Monitoring influx and call wait times can easily mitigate this. Expecting people to spend upwards of 45 minutes to even be dealt with is unacceptable. People are already being handled poorly before they've even began the call which sets things off on a bad foot.

It would be interesting to know if your calls are how your type as personally I think your explanations of "we can't do that" are very poor too. I would hope you're explaining why certain things can't be done or why timelines are in place, in my experience the more details you give as to why something cannot be done helps the customer understand and lowers frustration levels.

Death threats and abuse are not acceptable and very clearly should be stated as such and calls terminated when it does happen. But customer service standards are slipping across the board.

We have to ask
I usually say is the number you're calling from still the correct number
But if I don't confirm 4 pieces of information then it's failed GDPR and I risk a performance plan/disciplinary