Is there a service where I can pay someone to talk to phone support for me?
YES, there is: https://www.karensforhire.com/
I like it. Can't tell if it's a joke or not, but I like it.
Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
71–80 of 149 posts
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#72Unlikely. Phone support was one of those things that was driving people insane before. Remember jokes about hold music, foreign accents and phone menus? I personally can't stand phone support. It always takes way longer than it needs to, and I can't do anything else during it. Just firing off an email is far more efficient. Easier to do after office hours too.
The problem is that it's been replaced with either nothing or a help page that doesn't solve your problem. I recently had a company email me saying: > In this case, your review of___ has been flagged because we couldn’t verify its authenticity, and on that basis we’ve removed your review from our platform. > While we’re confident that this is the right call, we appreciate that sometimes we get it wrong. If you think…
Which company? Seems like we should all be avoiding them if possible
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#73Support chat is pretty terrible, but poor quality phone support isn‘t that great either, in my view. (High-quality phone support does exist, but is unfortunately increasingly rare.) I wish email support was more of a thing in the US. Not chat, not a web-only form or ticketing system, just plain old email (on the frontend): It leaves a paper trail (persisted within my control), it has minimal overhead (the forced supe…
> It leaves a paper trail (persisted within my control), it has minimal overhead (the forced superficial friendliness or attempts of small talk in support chats are deeply disturbing to me), it works on a bad internet connection, it works asynchronously.
This one is frustrating to me as well. After telling the chatbot about your problem and waiting 20 minutes to be connected with a real person, only to have them open with "Hi! How are you today?" and then pause the script for a response is incredibly grating.
They also don't seem to be using any sort of functioning ticketing system or even hot-transfer, because being forced to re-explain the issue 3+ times to different reps on the same chat seems just as common as it was in the phone days.
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#74Not just private industry. Seattle PD literally doesn't pick their phones up. Do a Google search for "seattle pd non emergency" and you'll see that everyone in the city is having this problem. Sometimes they just turn off the phone tree entirely. And no, don't talk about "defunding" - Seattle PD is lavishly funded. They just like to throw temper tantrums when they're held accountable.
The quiet quitting no one is talking about.
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#75Ever tried to get someone on the phone at UPS? It's impossible. If you have a problem in store, with a driver, or anything, it's impossible to get a live human being through the UPS phone number. I googled, I tried every trick, but the system assertively refuses to grant you the privilege of speaking with a human. I truly believe that most major companies do not want their customers to talk to an individual, and use…
> I truly believe that most major companies do not want their customers to talk to an individual, and use tactics to dissuade customers from calling and frustrate those who do. Not in every country. In Japan, most companies have a responsive help line.
is it toll free?
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#76Support has a very poor ROI it seems. A person calls into a bank to ask about a bank account and all profit is basically eliminated in that one interaction.
One of my employers basically determined that clients below ~5000 ARR are not worth serving. Their issues cannot be forwarded to anything above front line support. Doesn't matter how stuck they are or what sales promised.
Just skim off the cream that don't need help and dump the rest.
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#77I understand your problem completely. Even though you gave it to the support person before me, and the person before that, would you please give me your full name, and last four of your Social Security number. Thank you. Can you describe the nature of your problem? But before we continue, please provide your customer PIN.
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#78Unlikely. Phone support was one of those things that was driving people insane before. Remember jokes about hold music, foreign accents and phone menus? I personally can't stand phone support. It always takes way longer than it needs to, and I can't do anything else during it. Just firing off an email is far more efficient. Easier to do after office hours too.
I find that using phone support and being genuinely nice to the other person on the line is a nice way to sometimes get benefits you don't expect, like airplane upgrades... I purchased a used ipad and the only way to get the thing turned on was to talk to a customer support agent, who had to basically manually flip a database column for me. Besides these days you can either set a callback, or, just plain do work whil…
My story about being nice: Once sent in a complaint that wasn't really a complaint, more of an FYI that one of their things was broken.
Lo and behold, a few months later, I get an apologetic email with a $300 credit. It was obvious they didn't even read my complaint, and therefore won't fix it, but I'll take the $300.
And no, they didn't cause me anywhere near $300 in harm by any measure.
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#79A quick practical tip: when asked what you want, tell the bot 'sales' (or anything else that brings in $$ for the business).
That way you're likely to get you access to a human or phone number. It worked for me recently contacting Apple.
Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane
#80Just recently switched banks to a bank whose selling point is that you always get a human on the phone. They don't even have a phone tree. It's glorious!
I think my credit union is still like that... but it's been a while since I had to call.