The horror of call centres and zombies in my workplace.

[Fortis]

Well...In the ongoing adventures of being corporately employed...I cam into work and watched the entire system crash and all systems but the phones go down just as I was logging in for the day.
So no customer files, no ability to manipulate anything, no service booking or remote access to clients machines...Zilch. Big black screen of death...And the phones.

This left me and the other dispute reolution staff at a bit of a loss...there were lots of angry and irate callers, but nothing at all we could do, so we decided to log into the general system and help the rest of the customer service staff out until the system was back up. The system was down for seven and three quarter hours.

I have no idea how call centre people do it. I anser and introduce myselfon the phone maybe twenty times a day if it is a bad day, and then spend 10-40 minutes working out solutions for people...The folks i the bear pit do the intro thing around 45 times and hour!!!!
And now so were we.

Worse still, when you need to tell someone that unfortunately the system is down and you are unable to help them, please call back in two to two and a half hours when the system should be back up and we will be happy to help you (We were optimistic in our estimate)....It gets monotonous to keep saying it...

So Michael and myself, who either should share an office more often or never sit together during work hours again, started trying to throw in new twists.. .

Mine went something like:

Hello, My name's alex, How may I help you?"

Hi, I want to do blah blah and blah and the system is not registering my selection, also I want to check on my account, organise a service call and have the magazine re-issued as it was eaten by...

I would be happy to help you with all that, unfortunately the entire system is down due to a technical issue they are chasing down and we are essentially looking at blank screens and asking people to please call back in two to three hours when the official line is that the system will be back up.

Official line? You think it won't be worth calling back in two hours or is there a way of getting things done sooner?

Actually, I think that the entire tech staff have turned into flesh-eating zombies who are even now shambling around the lower levels of this building, eating innocent passers-by and uttering their forlorn cries of "Braiiiiinnnnnssssss!". I listened at the stairwell about ten minutes ago and I am sure I heard them. Frankly if they manage to work out elevators I may not be here at all when you call back. But all in all, if we do manage to find a cure and get the surviving techs back to work on the essential problem at hand, we ought to be able to help you in a few hours, so please do call back.

The customer, fairly formal and high powered corporate type, was just about wetting himself laughing by the end of it and saying he was about to log the problem as close to word for word as he could at his end. Basically decided that while the down time was inconvenient I had just made his day and he didn't mind.

Hung up the phone and got a "we are not worthy" from Michael at the other desk and form the team leader who I had not seen come in and stand behind me I got a look faceplant into both palms and shake head in disbelief while trying not to laugh so much that tears were cming out (this is not the first time I have had this effect on her, mind you).

All in all, I class that as a win.


Tough day though. We got to spend 9 hours not only dealing with clients, but also lifting the morale of 140 odd staff who were understandably enough getting pretty frustrated and moddy about getting yelled at by customers without being able to do something for them. I rely heavily on props, I am told. In this instance giant bubble blowers, balloons and trays of sushi form the place down the road, I plan to use next months incidental budget on buying a remote control blimp (as per the story). Had a few calls that I sincerely wished I had system for, because they were right in my line, including one that was so serious and immediate I ended up by-passing the entire system down issue and reaching for the white-pages and making some dire calls. Something about our techs drilling through the water main in the roof of a retirement home and flooding three floors so that 97year olds were needing to be evacuated that I thought we should do something about sooner than eventually...


I like my work. Really, but some days it takes more out then it gives back. I guess I should count myself lucky it is only some days. Most days I go home feeling proud that I have actually done good work for people.


Alex

[AdriftAtSea]

Alex-

My guess is that you have far more experience dealing with zombies than you've been letting on. :)  Your real name wouldn't happen to be Ash and you wouldn't happen to have a metal hand and a shotgun, would you??

[Fortis]

Sorry, I have steel buttocks and a small swiss-made garlic crusher.

Not nearly as useful in the fight against the undead.

[AdriftAtSea]

Alex-

At least the steel buttocks will prevent future recurrences of ass kickings... :) once they break their foot on it. :)