30 May, 2007

I'm a little hoarse right now

Well, truth be told, I actually have very little voice left at all.

I told J I'd spent 45 minutes yelling at a customer and he got all concerned and wondered what had happened. It's very out of character for me to yell, let alone yell at a customer.

So, I had my little giggle and told him I'd actually been yelling to a customer. Long story short - the customer had emailed in about some username/password problems and even after questioning a fair bit, we couldn't work out if it was with the initial connection or his email (in case you're wondering - his Mac worked, his pc didn't). Eventually we asked him to call in and see if we could sort it out quicker. He said he would but commented that he was a bit deaf and the last time he'd called, he'd hung up in frustration because he spoke to someone with an accent and they wouldn't slow down even after he'd explained he couldn't hear and understand them.

Now, previously I've worked in radio and found that speaking slowly and clearly is one of my strengths, so I figured rather than have this guy take his chances, I'd call him (though it's not what we usually do). Well, we sorted the problem, even though it took ages - and many many many repetitions of commands. I was sitting there shouting down the phone line, with my team mates having a good laugh at my expense (heh, we all do it to each other). In the end the customer was so happy to have the problem sorted that he told me I should get employee of the month award!

I'm thinking now I should have warmed up my voice before I called (even though voice exercises are so very embarrassing to do in public)! My voice has just been getting worse and worse all day. I'm down to just whispering now.

I have to say though - the funniest thing was speaking with Chickie earlier. Once my voice was pretty much down to a whisper, he started whispering back to me. I explained he didn't have to but he couldn't seem to stop. The way he was acting, it was like telling him dinner was ready and to come have his teeth brushed etc, were all big secrets!

8 comments:

Oh great One said...

Good for you for going that extra mile! When I run into someone who takes good care of me not only do I prais them but I ask for their boss. You never know when a good comment can make a difference!

Incidently I have a hard time with phone operators too and I'm not hard of hearing. Between the background noise on their end and mine I'm frazzled!

Is it sync'd yet? said...

I think IM would have done wonders here eh? What?

You know you are in trouble when someone says there words "What do you mean double click?".


Gnat.
.

Anonymous said...

Ha ha! I love Chickie whispering back to you!!!!!!!!

The Phosgene Kid said...

I consider Mrs Phos losing her voice a bonus.

meggie said...

I think you went over & above your duty!
I have had some sessions with help people lately getting my computer problems sorted. I have found them to be so helpful & polite. I do make sure to tell them so.

Anonymous said...

My dad is hard of hearing...
I have to yell the play by play of every movie at him. it's so annoying!
LOL Good on ya for taking special time for this fella.

Steve said...

Speaking of accents, there's a Sri Lankan guy at work who organises to get interim phones returned after a fault has been fixed. Because of his accent he often has to start his calls with, "I'm not trying to sell anything".

As far as whispering is concerned, I used to work with a deaf guy who was very good at reading lips. Most of us when we spoke to him automatically lowered our voices to a whisper. All that is except one guy who you could hear whispering from the other end of the building.

caramaena said...

oh great one - as someone who works in a call centre, thank you for passing on any praise you feel is deserved. It's great to hear it from customers and even better for your boss to hear it.

As for background noise, it can be difficult. I'm really thankful that I have a desk at the end of the building. Not only do I have windows right near me but it means I get slightly less noise (sometimes the noise drives me batty).

gnat - I'd love to be able to use IM to fix some customer's problems (to be honest, I sometimes wish I could just log into the customer's computer and fix it myself! I used to do that with my mum and it was sooo much easier).

Speaking of double click problems, I had a friend many years ago that just could not get the hang of left clicking (and therefore double clicking). Eventually I gave up and just showed him how to right click and open via the dropdown menu!

kirsty - it was cracking me up too :)

phos - am I right in thinking she's a teacher? If so, I suppose her students would think that would be amusing.

meggie - and they really appreciate being told, in my experience. It always puts a smile on my face :)

island jen - thanks, I'm not sure I could handle doing the shouting all the time and having to do so while trying to watch something would be hard to deal with.

steve - Oh that would be hard for your workmate. I never really thought about it but I suppose these days people just assume when they hear an accent on a call they're not expecting, they assume it's a telemarketer from an Indian call centre.

On the whispering - lol!