Voice mail hell. Share your story

[ChairmanAgnostic]

Today, I received a purchase (yes, I really saw the ad, and bought the tool. Frankly, if it works, it is perfect for some of my artwork creation, given that my steel tools are too big and powerful, while, Dremel is a source of amusement by the material to be shaped) I only purchased it with the express promise (which i duly advised them I would record, and did record) that they would charge no shipping fees. Of course, when it arrived, certain parts of the order were missing, and they charged shipping fees.
So I called.

My Voice Mail Hell; Surprise, it only took 5 minutes and 4 number pushes to get a live person. but, they could not help, so they transferred me to a supervisor. 1st disconnect.
Repeat.
2nd Disconnect.
Repeate.
3d Disconnect
FINALLY a live person. Who transferred me to someone else, who had me on hold, then transferred me again, back to the first person, who then agreed to waive shipping.

Frankly, that was 20 minutes well spent. But, heh, that was nothing like Sprint. SPRINT voicemail was absolutely the worst I have ever had. I kept a timer going on Day 1, and between 20 minutes, 43 minutes, 61 minutes and 14 minutes, all on hold, repeating my story each time, then with a transfer or more hold, each and every time hearing sales pitches, and how great SPRINT was, I actually had to call again on the next 4 consecutive days before I got a resolution. (My office cell was not functioning, they claimed it was, I cannot tell how much business I lost).

Sprint was the worst, but Dish TV came close.

Which has been your worst voicemail hell tale?

[graywarrior]

1. The Registry of Motor Vehicles in MA and FL

Waited 10 minutes just to get to another voice mail telling me all agents were currently attending customers but that my call was important to them and to please hold. 40 minutes later, I got someone who could not help. Took me a week to get my license transferred after calling every day to fix the problem that in the end no one could figure out what the problem was in the first place.

[CurtEastPoint]

2. Too many to share but one gov't agency recently...

can't recall which one: went thru multiple prompts, presses, etc. and finally got a recording that said something to the effect that "we are much too busy now. Please call back later. Click." Now THAT pissed me off.

There are sites that tell you how to get a 'real' person, like this one: http://www.realtechnews.com/posts/2983 and http://www.gethuman.com/

I would love to throttle whoever came up with this piece of shit technology. "We value your call." Yeah? If you did you'd answer the fucking phone!

[imdjh]

3. Oddly enough: Apple Computer and Verizon Online, but for different reasons.

Apple Computer because they play whiny boyband music that for some reason sounds even more like crap on their telephone system. Apple Computer, because they are determined to not talk to you once your "phone support" has expired, even if it's a general question about something they just did or you want to know if there is a known issue. Apple Computer, because even when they do deign to talk to you, they want you to identify the hell out of yourself and your product without even knowing if your questiong requires such knowledge or can even be answered.

Verizon, because you are calling them because your broadband is not working and they are telling you on the phone to go to their website.
Verizon, because they swear they don't offshore their customer service, but the person speaking to you has a thick Indian accent and says his name is Brian.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

5. no, my name is bhaijan B. . Ah . . Aye . . Ah . . . Ennn. Bhaijan.

I have a number of dear friends who are indian, and most of them are highly educated, and THEY complain about service support on phone. From Indians that they cannot understand. (My dearest friends speak several language, and when they try one of the many indian languages, they hear . . . . . . . . . shocked silence.

Yeah, I love that one.

"Dude, my intertube access ain't tubing."
"Well, we recommend you get online and try our website."


kind of like a corporate Fuck You, eh?

[imdjh]

7. In fairness to the Indians, what they do is pretty amazing.

It might not be what I need them to do, but it is pretty amazing that these people ramp up so well. The accents may be thick, but the command of the language is excellent, and the fact that they are getting these folks to speak Spanish, French, Italian, and German now too, is astounding.

I'm trying to imagine an American call center where there are so many truly bilingual and trilingual people. I have worked in a call center, and while many of the Spanish speaking employees can function in English, others really couldn't do it up to the level of customer service standards. On the other hand, many English speaking employees could do Spanish if they had to, but not fluid enough, fast enough, or idiomatically enough to talk to our Spanish speaking customers regularly.

[Ms. Toad]

30. Verizon is both my best and my worst....

Every call I've had with them about my phone service is among the best I've ever had. Always polite, accurate, and accommodating. Never a hold.

Every call I've had with them about my air card service has been among the worst. They know absolutely NOTHING about their own service. It took hours to get the day pass set up each of two separate days I needed one. The first day I had to read their web pages to them when they started insisting they had no day passes (fortunately I had printed them out ahead of time), then had to correct them when they tried to charge me an initialization fee (which doesn't exist for day passes). After well more than an hour, when I finally got the account all ready to go (a process I should have been able to do to get instanta ccess through the built-in-modem without human intervention, they informed me that I would have access in a couple of days. I was in a two hour window between flights on a Friday when I needed access to my computer for crucial medical information for a test my daughter was having on Monday - which I needed to have during working hours in advance of Monday. Needless to say, I went ballistic.

The second time, I thought I had all the magic words figured out - but it still took hours to get it set up.

The final kicker - days after I used each $10 day pass, I received a fed-ex envelope from them with whatever someone there imagined a day pass to be - I suspect sending it to me cost more than the pass itself.

[Bobbie Jo]

4. AT&T....hands down.

Worst.Ever.

Worst customer service I have EVER experienced. If you're going attempt to call these hacks to resolve an issue, you had better pack a lunch and set aside at least half a day. God forbid you have to hang up to attend to...oh I don't know, work or some other nonsense. Also..be prepared to explain your issue a minimum of 6 times before you get to someone who has any authority to address your problem.

I loathe AT&T with every fiber of my being. :mad:

[ChairmanAgnostic]

6. I read about a Lego story on dKos,

where the service person was polite, friendly, and asked to talk to the kid.
TO THE KID, TO APOLOGIZE that their set was missing an important piece!

amazing.

my honey was arranging a flight for her client, and because of some other demands on time, I ended up calling ANA, All Nippon Airways, to arrange her client's flight's last details.

Smooth. Friendly. Cooperative. Worked hard to accomplish what I(she) needed, and then at the last second, "Oh sir, would your client mind if we upgraded him to business class? You have been so patient, and it took longer than I expected."

Hell, yes, . . . . . no, that's wrong. Hell NO, he would not mind.

Next time to Japan, I fly ANA.

I also have a Charminggrill grill, which worked great the first year, then began to suffer issues the next. The website was plain, simple and did not really make things easy. But the phone support! Awesome, They put on a techie who said, "Naw, forget the instruction book. I think we had a Russian speaker translate it into Attic Greek, from which we got Summarian, then we had a jew try a Hebrew version, just to piss of our Iranian translator, who sent it to our Chinese Mandarin person, who outsourced it to Germany for a good look at Maori, with some Latvian verbs and grammar."

I could not make that up. And then, in simple terms he said, "Here's your solution." which worked perfectly.
I love service calls to people with a sense of humor.

[Bobbie Jo]

10. Experiences like these should be standard course rather than the exception.

Unfortunately these days, they're few and far between. Just makes me appreciate good customer service all the more when it actually happens.

[conscious evolution]

19. You will like this

I got a text from them asking to rate their customer service.
For me I have always managed to get decent service when I have to deal withthem.So I decided to answer and say yes I get good service.
Wouldn't you know it-trying to answer their survey turned into voice mail hell.I gave up pretty quick.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

25. LOL, that IS scary.

I recently had e-mail hell, not to mention snailmail hell.

Someone (I suspect an olde law skule buddy, with a sense of humor far worse than mine) signed me up as a future parent. Amazing how the intertubes suddenly attack you with diaper ads and worse

[blonndee]

22. I'm on hold with those effing idiots right now!

ASSHOLES. Incompetent fools. I am about to blow my top, seriously. This is the SECOND time in less than a month that I have spent close to an hour on the phone trying to get credit for internet service they billed me for which was never even ORDERED and I never RECEIVED! Claimed they gave me a credit and resolved the issue two weeks ago. Instead, I get a SECOND bill with the initial charges PLUS another month's worth of non-existent internet on top of it.

I'm going to have a stroke or a heart attack over this shit. :mad:

[LibDemAlways]

8. Recently the California DMV. I tried to get an appointment for a

Driver's License test. After being kept on hold 20 minutes I was finally directed to a recorded message that guided me through the process of setting up the appointment. Then I was told to hold for a confirmation number. After another wait a voice informed me that the system was down and I would have to try again. This happened twice.

I've had plenty of other frustrating experiences, but this one was my most recent.

[dixiegrrrrl]

11. The trick to the Ca DMV is

to drive to one near Eureka.

Couple of small towns there that are not as crowded.

And no, I am not kidding.

I fortunately had a reason to be in the area at the same time I needed to re-new.
It would have been worth the drive.

[LibDemAlways]

23. I wish I lived somewhere like that. I live near Thousand Oaks,

home of the rudest, least helpful DMV personnel in the state. After experiencing the frustration described above, I finally succeeded in making an appointment for my daughter's road test over the internet. When we arrived at the T.O. DMV, they couldn't locate the appointment and flat out refused to take her. They agreed to put her on a waiting list in case someone didn't show up, and then they forgot about her. After three hours we left. I was pissed. She now has an appointment out in Oxnard next Monday, a good 40 minutes from my home. It was all she could get before her permit expires. The entire process has been a screwed up nightmare.

[kickysnana]

9. Setting up an appointment for an eye exam last week

Called the number in the phone book. Message said that number had been changed please call #######. Called the new number was asked what clinic I wanted, pushed the number, clinic asked what department I wanted (no number for a person), picked opthomology message says "This mailbox is no longer functioning. We have no more help for you. Please call back another time. So I called the CS number that was given to me and got the message. This number has been changed please call #######, Got a voice mail. Told them my problem. They called back the following workday Monday and left a message on our answering machine giving me the original incorrect number that was in the phone book.

Bet their appointments have dropped off dramatically.

[buzzycrumbhunger]

12. Comcast is a contender

Not for the length of being on hold, but for giving you the brush-off in record time. I'm stuck with them for internet. In FL, that means when it rains heavily, most likely my internet goes out. They also like to do maintenance in the middle of the night--when I'm working. I've had periods when it was out nightly for a couple weeks solid. (Come to think of it, I never did see the promised credits on my bill. . .)

So the cable went out the other night. Track down my mobile (I have VoIP, so can't just call from the house line) and hit the speed dial.

Sorry, this number has been disconnected. Huh? No more local number?

Luckily, I still had a paper bill somewhere (all my bills are now online--where I couldn't get to them), which listed two 800 numbers for service issues. I call the first one. . . and get a quick sales pitch about how if I'm interested in marketing through their service, please contact them for information. Click. I don't know if it was even Comcast, but WTF--no ID, no option to wander through their voice mail, no way to even leave a message.

Fine. I call the second number. It doesn't ring. Just eventually has a recorded message that says, "Please enter your 10-digit phone number." I did, and it promptly hung up on me. Tried it again in case I dialed wrong. Nope, same deal.

You apparently are not welcome to contact the bastids anymore, save via their website--which is also a joy to navigate (NOT).

If we get any kind of competition, I am ditching them as fast as I can. Back when I could reach them, I always got morons who were incapable of deviating from their menu and tried to insist I reset my router repeatedly to see if it wasn't my fault before they'd even check to see if there was an outage reported or maintenance in progress, and even then, made you sit through the spiel where "if we find it's not our fault, you will be charged for a service call." Lousy service. I use DirecTV and Vonage, so would looooove to make a clean break.

[LiberalAndProud]

15. Out when it rains, huh?

You have a corroded connection leading to your house. We got TimeWarner to come out to fix ours. It's so nice now ...

[buzzycrumbhunger]

21. Yep--and nope

I make them give me a fresh drop to the house every 2-3 years because the cable degrades in the heat. We can tell when it's time because the speed suddenly slacks off and we get constant disconnects regardless of the weather.

The problem here is that half the line is buried in our neighborhood--and we only have to dig down 1 foot for salt water to bubble up. When it rains, there isn't anywhere for the water to go but up. This is after their "awesome" fiber optic upgrade, mind you. They don't seem to send their varsity squad out to deal with this at night, either. It's a bad combination of crappy equipment, incompetent staff, and poor visibility.

Sadly, we live on a little tit of land out of the way of everywhere, so no one else is beating a path to offer competition. I would say I'm looking forward to the end of the rainy season, but then we get wildfires. "Tropical paradise," my arse. :P

[kickysnana]

13. Tracfone

I have an old Tracfone, just this side of analog and wanted to check the date that the "keep active" option would bill my bank account for $4.90. It asked me if I wanted to see a new plan that might be better so I checked and it was more so I said no thank you. That action evidently automatically un enrolled me in their "keep active" plan so I went back and it said I was no longer enrolled. So I attempted to re enroll and it said that they were no longer accepting new enrollments in that plan. So I called CS and waited about 10 minutes until the CS (in another country answered) She listened to me and tried to re enroll me and told me that she could not. So I asked for someone who could. She talked for about 5 minutes repeating the same thing that she was sorry she could not do what I asked because my phone was not eligible. She did finally transfer me to a supervisor 5 minute wait who went through exactly the same thing. I asked to be connected to someone who could help, override the block and they gave me a number which I called and was told that that number was no longer in service. I scoured the web and found a number for Tracfone expedited service supposedly in the US but they had 9-4 hours and I would have to call back. I called back the next day and got exactly the same runaround and finally got someone who told me they would forward it to someone who could unblock my access and I should try again in 5 days. I did and it was the same. I called back and they had no idea who it might have been forwarded to and could not help me. They did say that I could transfer my minutes to a newer phone and get the plan. So I powered up the phone I had given my Aunt when she was in the nursing home and they said that they needed to reactivate it but I needed to buy minutes in order for them to reactivate it. Transferring minutes would not work. I decided that I would go ahead and use their cheapest activation with double minutes for life and give my phone to a family member who needed one. I activated it and low and behold they could not go back to the previous plan, only the new plan that was almost double the cost per month. Not sure what I will do when this phone runs out of steam but I know I will not be dealing with Tracfone any more. Then they had the nerve to send a satisfaction survey for my "trouble call" in the mail with a place to put a contact number in case they wanted
to get back to me. That was March and I am still waiting.

[myrna minx]

17. I've had a good experience with Virgin Mobile pre pay.

It's $20 every 3 months and your minutes roll over if you don't use them. It's 18 cents a minute, but if you only use it once in a while like I do, it's worth it. I've had it for 3 years and I haven't had any issues (so far).

[LibDemAlways]

24. Don't ever lose the phone. The Virgin Mobile help number is unlisted and

unless you are calling from another Virgin Mobile phone or have access to the internet or keep the help number in your wallet (which I should have done), they are impossible to get hold of. My daughter lost her Virgin Mobile phone at a rock concert. She used a friend's phone to notify me. I tried to contact Virgin Mobile from my husband's ATT cell phone and was told repeatedly that there was no listing anywhere for Virgin Mobile. I wasn't able to cancel the service until I got home later and looked them up on the internet. By then whoever had the phone had used up all the minutes.

[myrna minx]

27. I'm sorry that happened to your daughter.

I lost (misplaced) my phone in my own garden and ruined it by watering it along with my perennials. :silly: I had "topped off" online at one time - so because of that I knew about the website and I was able to cancel my old phone and have it replaced. I have to admit that had I not navigated to their site prior to misplacing my phone, I wouldn't have known how to get in touch with them either. I discovered the water soaked phone the following week.

I was fortunate to have access to the internet right away after I discovered that I lost my phone, and not have lost it at a concert - where surly someone was delighted to steal her minutes. Thanks for the tip of keeping the number in my wallet. That never would have occurred to me.

Again - I'm sorry that happened to her.

[LibDemAlways]

29. She was probably jumping up and down and the phone fell out of her

pocket. It was actually a good lesson for her and an important lesson for me. I had no idea Virgin Mobile was so hard to get in touch with. Live and learn.

Sorry about your ruined phone. I know people who've accidentally deposited phones in the washing machine and in the Pacific Ocean. Needless to say they didn't survive!

[pipi_k]

20. Tracfone fuckers!!!

We had Tracfone service because we don't need hundreds of minutes each month. Number one, we don't get reliable cell service at the house. Number two, we only used it when we were out, which doesn't happen but once or twice a week.

anyway, I was having the bill paid automatically each month, and it was always BEFORE the "renew" thing appeared on the phone.

Then one time I added minutes to both phones and that changed the "add minutes by" date so that the billing date got screwed up and the service got shut off one one phone when it shouldn't have been. Got it turned back on, then they did it to the other phone. That's when I said "screw it" and we went with Verizon and we get like 700 minutes per month, of which at least 650 go unused.

Last year we were going to change the plan to either the Senior Plan or a Pay as you go plan except that my phone died 4 months before the contract was due and we had to renew the same plan in order to get a new phone that didn't cost a bundle.

anyway, one of my biggest beefs with CS at Tracfone was getting some young woman with one of those high squeaky voices who talks a mile a minute. My hearing isn't all that great anyway, and I can't understand high squeaky voices that talk a mile a minute, and to make it even worse, I had to keep asking the young women to PLEASE SPEAK UP. Even with the sound amplified on my phone. That's why I prefer to do stuff by email, but there are some things you just can't do that way, and anyway, I did try to conduct a few pieces of business with Tracfone by email and that didn't go so well either. Like they can't understand the written word or something.

[LiberalAndProud]

14. Mine is about Alltel.

Not Verizon, mind you. Alltel. Every day for weeks they've been robocalling my phone. When answered, first you get a multi-tiered tonal symphony, then the automated voice saying, "This is a call for," -- discernable pause followed by indecipherable mangling of the account holder's name. Included in the message was an insistent request that I call the given number. I called. There is NO way to speak to a real live human, because I must enter my account number. I dial 0, hoping that I'll be transferred somewhere out of robophone-land with that magical digit. No such luck. "That acount number is not valid. Please enter your account number."

The punch line is, I have no account with Alltel. Zero. None. So how do I get off their never-ending robocall list?

[TrogL]

16. Telus Mobility

What is it with cell phone companies?

I forget what it is I needed, something really simple like a problem with billing or activation.

Whatever it was, it was complex enough that I needed to talk to a supervisor and every time they transferred me, the line would go dead.

After the fourth time, as soon as I got a real person on the phone I said (with tears and panic in my voice) "Don't put me on hold, don't transfer me!!" She took pity on me and kept me on the line and patched the supervisor in to deal with the problem.

My best experience is with my cable company. They've learned that whenever I call, it's some bizarre technical issue so they don't even bother going through the script but just pass me on to someone who actually understands what I'm babbling about.

[necso]

18. Recently, Verizon DSL.

But a decent treatment would take too many words... and too many expletives.

In highlight (which actually leaves out all the fun with the automated portion of their "support" system -- at one point I kept getting "I don't understand.", and was pretty close to giving up): Wouldn't admit the problem was on their end (which it was; looks like my old modem got orphaned by default on "switch boot") and insisted it was my old modem (which it wasn't; someone at a higher level got the connection working in seconds (which lasted about 24 hours)... in the old days all it took was a reset at the CO). Tried to sell(!) me a support plan to solve a problem I didn't have (.99/month -- turning into what down the road, 1.99, 2.99, 4.99...?).

Now, I did get a new modem for free (?!?), but my OS isn't supported, there wasn't any CD or booklet, and I had to call Verizon again to get it working -- in the process of which they had me turn off (as in, intended to be off permanently) the modem firewall! (Of course, I turned it back on, configured it, etc.)

[question everything]

26. I called the company that served my mortgage and before being put on hold

I had an option to "if you know the extension of the person," etc.

After several attempts and being on hold forever, I called and punched: 1-2-3-4-5

Someone answered: "the office of the President."

Oh, heavens. She was really nice, I explained to her the problem, gave her the details and let her chase the "customer service" people. She gave me her direct line and, eventually, the mistake was corrected.

[SmileyRose]

31. Spaceballs

The reason why the secret code to steal all the air was 12345 was so funny is because execs are generally so oblivious they just go with that. It's probably the most common password execs use. The other one is 2580 - right down the middle of phone keypad.

[question everything]

32. Love it! And they are too lazy to remember something more complex

so they get something easy. Another, I suppose, would be 1379 for the same reason.

[Barack_America]

28. I once spent 5 hours on hold with the phone company...

I had two lines going, my house and cell phones. After 5 hours somebody picked up on the cell phone, so I hung up the house phone. Then person on the cell phone says, "oh I'm sorry, you have the wrong dept." and transfered me back to hell.

Tears ensued.

When I finally got through* and got the line set up, they switched the lines so that if you called me it went to somebody else's house and vice versa.

I will admit daydreaming of violence whenever I drove by their local building.


*My mother put it on speaker phone at work and signed me up. She waited on hold for 8 hours.