Telephone Support

April 21, 2008, 9:15 PM

Ever have to correct a problem through telephone support? It's a painful process. I had to call 1-800-4MY-XBOX to find out why it is my Xbox 360 disappeared from records after I sent it in for repairs roughly 2 months ago. It felt like a boss battle with multiple stages.

Stage 1: Automated response.
- You call the number. Instead of hearing the voice of another person on the other end, you're greeted by a machine. It speaks slowly, and it doesn't give you an option that relates with your problem. After half an hour of screaming at the lifeless voice, it directs you to the next stage.

Stage 2: Foreign telephone operator.
- You struggle to understand a single word the character on the other end is saying. You feel like a jerk for asking him/her to repeat themselves over and over, but there's no other way. After half an hour of painful conversation, it becomes clear that this person cannot help you. You need a supervisor, but first...

Stage 3: You're on hold.
- Enjoy the soothing sounds of crappy elevator music as you wait an eternity for the supervisor to take your call. In my case, I got to listen to the Halo theme for twenty minutes. Prove your worth in the area of patience and endurance to reach the next stage!

Stage 4: The supervisor.
- She's fast-talking and overly pleasant. Her voice can shatter glass. Also, she has nothing to tell you that you don't already know. Essentially, she's just the telephone operator...but you can understand what she's saying. She apologizes half a dozen times before scheduling a telephone appointment in the future. She needs time to formulate an effective strategy for driving you crazy...

To be continued Wednesday at a time between 5-7 PM EST...

...and that's just with this one problem I have. God knows how much it happens overall. Damn annoying, I tell yah.

April 21, 2008, 10:54 PM

Hahaha. How true. However, there's one big difference. Boss battles are normally fun.

April 22, 2008, 1:07 AM

Ugh I had to ring tiscali or BT or someone about my mmodem cracking up and he was so unhelpful, just told me to try all the things Id already tried and I was like well that was a waste of my time and money seeing as I was none the wiser at the end of said call....

I got it working eventually....I just rebooted my pc

Now WHY the idiot didn't sugest that in the first place is beyond me

April 22, 2008, 1:18 AM

I called Dell Support when my computer got a virus and the guy was really helpful (not to mention we were talking about gaming and anime at the same time...And I probably flirted JUST a little bit XD) , so I guess I was lucky in that respect; probably other stuff I'd have more problems with.

April 22, 2008, 3:26 AM

I never get any help if I have to call any telephone support. I'm directed everywhere and I wish their was just a simple option right away that would let you talk to an actual person instead of a machine.

What's even worse are those voice automated responses. It's really hard to pronounce the words when you have an accent, and it gets very frustrating!

April 22, 2008, 3:34 AM

It's hard to get the machine to register the words correctly when you don't have an accent. I can't begin to imagine how infuriating it'd be for those who do happen to have one. Those machines are garbage.

April 22, 2008, 10:09 AM

I hate those machine one's you have to talk too, and you always get the 'this may be recorded' message, if some one is gunna listen to it anyway, why can't some one just answer the phone?

They never seem to understand my accent, I actually have to put one on so it understands the difference between YES & NO....goddamit

All I wanted to know was the viewing times for a film at the cinema & it went right round the houses asking me stupid questions

April 22, 2008, 5:25 PM

HOLY CRAP I hate it when they transfer me to some operator in India. In person, I usually have no trouble understanding accents, but over the phone I have no idea what they're saying. I had to get a password reset for my internet once and so they had to tell me the numbers and letters, and I had to ask the guy to repeat it like 12 times so I could get it right.

It takes long enough through; it's even more bothersome when the communication sucks, and the phone is buzzing. v _ v

April 22, 2008, 5:50 PM

I hate calling certain companies such as Verzion and I need to ask them a question that's not on their damn automated voice help thing. Then it takes forever to get through it and request for a damn operator. Some of these telephone support lines don't have an option to talk to an operator in the begining either. >=/

I remember canceling my Verizon DSL and it took me forever. They kept transferring me to other operators asking me if I would take back their service and offer me some special. I should have been more anal about it and yelled at them. :/ I don't want their shitty DSL innernetz thx.