Have you forgotten what it is like to talk to a human over the phone? I called my city offices the other day and my call was answered with a recording.
This peeved me a bit so I left an unkind message. I wasn’t rude; I just told them that as a public agency they were doing a disservice to the community by not having a live person answer the phone. I did not leave my name or number.
Ten minutes later, the city office called me. Apparently, caller ID is working fine.
If you relate to the frustration and difficulty of trying to talk to a live person when you call a company, go to getahuman and try their cheat sheet. They provide you with information that will help you navigate the automated menu. It’s a neat website and you get to rate the company you call.
Write it down,
Carma
And here is another tip for contacting a real live person. And oh how they hate me for telling you about this.
ReplyDeletePress releases! Oh ya, a press release always has a phone number at the very bottom with a live persons contact info right down to the full name and email usnually with a phone extension.
Why? Because press releases are company promotions and always offer a direct link to a live person so they can directly sale their company products, stock and the sorts.
Here is one example. Its a press release about Microsoft and Yahoo. I see some direct lines here on this one. Hmmm, Wonder if I can call Jessie Anderson at Yahoo (LOL)?
http://docs.yahoo.com/docs/pr/release1265.html
Hi diga_div,
ReplyDeleteThat is a great tip. Technology makes us more productive but somehow the human relationship is becoming abused.
Thanks for stopping by.
Wow, how do you find these tidbits!
ReplyDeleteLove that site.
L
A family member has been having a hellacious time with the local cable service. He can't seem to get a hold of a live human.
ReplyDeleteNeedless to say, his bad experience prompted him to search for answers since this was the worst customer service he has ever experienced.
Because Press Release information can be so widely spread these days, we used to create a "person" for press releases and such. That way we know where the caller got the phone number.
ReplyDeleteMaybe that was not nice but it helped us track the source of calls. It also let us keep our private information - private. It's not that I don't want to have customers assited. I don't want all of the sales calls, the service providers, and the people who don't want to look at their instruction manual to be calling the head of the company or the director of marketing to do for them what they could do for themselves.
As for the cable company - good luck. Once they have the city contract you have very little leverage. Get to know your city officials. They have the direct numbers. So do the suppliers to these companies.
Hello Roger, Welcome to Carma's Window.
ReplyDeleteUsing a press release to track information is a pretty good marketing tool. I don't see anything wrong with that.
Voice mail will never take the place of a human voice or good customer service. With voice mail a person can't take a name or prove that they made the call.
The receiver of the call can always say,"I didn't get your message." and no one can prove it.
Therefore, the rub...between humans and robots. We all just have to learn to deal with it.