Wednesday, July 30, 2008

The Meaning of Words and How to Listen to Them

One recurring annoyance here at SBLB is our customers' lack of reasonable listening skills.

Since we are servicing our customers over the phone and are therefore unable to verify their identity with a photo ID, we must compensate using other methods of identification. For SBLB, the information we require is the customer's full name, full address, and last 4 digits of their social security number.

For some people, this is very complicated.

Once the caller gives their account number, I have all of their account information up on the screen in front of me. I now ask them to verify it for me.

"May I have your first and last name, please?" I ask.

"Natalie, N-A-T-A-L-I-E, Smith, 'S' like Sam, 'M' like Mary, 'I' like Ig--"

"Thank you Ms Smith, I can see your name here, I just needed you to verify it. Now can you please verify your FULL address?"

"Oh, ok. 4231 Imadumbass Lane."

"...And the city, state, zip code, and apartment number, please..."

"Oh. Milwaukee. Apartment B2."

Whatever, I think, because that's allowed, according to our policy.

This happens several times a day. I've thought of keeping a tally, but it would be too exhausting. I just wonder, when I say SO clearly and deliberately put a lot of emphasis on the word "full," why so many people either can't hear, or actually think that their full address does not include their city, state, and zip code. And their apartment number!

Let's not forget the constant spelling of names. I want to tell them all to STFU because I'm looking at it, and what do they think, that we type it in each time they call? Why even ask for the account number? But I say nothing because before I worked in a call center, I would do the same damn thing anytime I called any company.

BUT, there are weird ones. Like, for example, Taquanisha Jones calls in and tells me her first name is Taquanisha and her last names is Jones, J-O-N-E-S. As though I should know how to spell an uncommon and unique first name, but be totally clueless as to how to spell one of the most common names in the US.

(I haven't really talked to someone with that specific name, but that happens a lot, you get the idea.)

Or, when someone says and spells their entire name for me so freaking fast that they'd be insane to think that anyone actually typing it would have not only heard, but typed it all in that time period.

I guess as customers, we don't often think of these little nuances or irritating things that we do, or don't do, or how we just don't listen. I certainly hadn't, until I started encountering them 20, 30, 100 times a day.

Sigh.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

She's Back; or, Capitalism Sucks

Well, it sure has been a while since I've updated this blog. I admit, it was due to my annoyance and lack of patience for Blogger's new Google thing, and I actually couldn't get into the site. I seemed to have it figured out now.

I don't have much to report, other than I'm still at SBLB and it is still dull and I still get customers every day like the ones described in the most recent post, and I'm not promoted yet because I haven't bothered looking for anything else. You know, exactly how I would have predicted.

So, the other day, I got to take 4 or so hours off the phone to attend a class called "Keys To Success," which I didn't rememebr signing up for but was thrilled about being scheduled for nonetheless. You see, even 5 unscheduled minutes off the phone is like a summer vacation, so imagine my joy after seeing 4 hours of something that claimed to help me be successful!

Turns out the class was just a deceptively named training on how to give good customer service, unfortunately taught by... Karen.

Sigh.

Whatever, though, I was still off of the phone, so I was having a good time.

However, during one point in our downtime where we managed to get Karen off track somehow, she was talking about how she takes calls every so often and once got a call from a man who had hundreds of thousands of dollars with SBLB in several accounts. The gentleman had accidently used the wrong check card and overdrew one of his smaller accounts and received 5 NSF fees. He called to see if he could get them reversed. Karen said that she could see the error, and it was too bad, and he obviously had more than enough money to cover his charges. Oops!

I asked her if she was able to reverse any of the fees. She proudly said yes, she was able to reverse all but one. She was missing my point, though. To be able to reverse all but one of 5 fees would require getting approval to go above and beyond what was already considered the exception. My response, which fell on deaf ears with the exception of one guy in the class, was, "I wish we could do that for our poor customers."

I mean, honestly. Oh, you poor rich guy, you goofed up and used the wrong card. Let me make a special exception and give you some money. You, terrible poor person who is on Social Security, you have 5 overdraft fees because someone you trusted wrote you a bad check and it bounced and your other checks posted afterward and we not only didn't pay them, but also charged you $34 per item. No, sorry, I can't reverse anything for you because we already reversed $17 in fees for you 5 and a half months ago. Pay us back before 30 days passes or your account is closed. Yeah, that does suck that you can't feed your kids or pay rent. Anything else I can help you with today?

Now, don't get me wrong, I understand that we are a corporation, a business, and not a non-profit organization. Banks need to make money. Banks do operate under ethically questionable practices, but either way, we spell it out loud and clear. Ever read your bank account's terms and conditions? I recommend it. It's utterly fascinating. However, I think there is something fundamentally wrong with the mentality that we should be punishing poor people and being sympathetic to and rewarding rich people.

But hey, the rich people would never be able to make money if it weren't for the oppressed poor. I sure hope I can do that someday.

I hope the sarcasm of the last sentence was apparent.

I think I'll go home and drink enough boxed wine to put me to sleep so I can come back and do this again tomorrow.