The Ninth Circle of Hell - Customer Service Lines

I have just spent over an hour on the phone to BT trying to resolve a problem. It's taken me 5 phonecalls to find out that it's not their fault and there's nothing they can do. in that time they hung up on me once, navigated me into a dead end and connected me to a headset that no one was connected to leaving me shouting down the line until Miranda deigned to pick up her headset and start the script as if nothing had happened. The issue I was trying to resolve turns out to not be BTs fault (well, more actually, not their problem) but I don't care, because I have had to deal with a mess of automated menus and 4 rude staff who gave the disctinct impression I was interfering with their coffee break.

I wrote the following a while ago as part of a series, but never have these words felt more true.

The innermost circle of hell is a space assigned to those who have betrayed people are close to. The traitors are punished by being buried in a frozen lake, the depth varying according to the severity of the betrayal, with Satan living at the very centre. To this region I am condemning all those companies that betray those they should in fact be thinking of above all others, their customers. How better to exemplify that then by labelling customer service lines as the 9th circle of hell.

No one calls a customer support line for the fun of it, you don't suddenly find yourself without a cd you fancy and desperately craving bad hold music. Generally speaking if you've got as far as digging out a phone number and dialling the thing, you've got good reason to do it. The chances are also pretty good that you're phoning to complain about something. It may be a sad indicator for our times but you very rarely have people ringing up just to tell someone how lovely they are.

You're either phoning up because something you want to happen, has not happened; something you don't want to happen, has happened; or because you want to do something completely out of the ordinary, like move house. At this glorious time in your life when you're living out of boxes and discovering that your furniture doesn't fit through any doors, the last thing you really want to be doing is faffing about trying to persuade companies that you would prefer not to continue paying the bills for your old property which is now occupied by a family of 28 who are trying to heat the entire borough. But they inform you that your account is assigned by GPS co-ordinates, so you'll need to shut everything down and start a new account. And there will be just a small surcharge for that.

Of course before you can get that far, you have to negotiate through the automated system. "For sales select 1" (Sales is always 1, they're not stupid), "to respond to our advert and spend money select 2, for account queries select..." at which point you hit the 3 button only to be dropped off the end of the exchange system because the message actually finished "...select 8#*4".

Several systems I've used then ask you to enter your customer ID so that they can run a quick check to see how profitable and troublesome you usually are to them, allowing them to assign you to a queue of appropriate length. Of course they don't make a note of that anywhere, so you'll still have to give all your details to a real human being who can't type.

Then the hold music starts. There are some standard choices here, Vivaldi or similar cheerful classical piece that doesn't quite make you want to kill yourself. More controversial choices can include songs the company has paid for to use in advertising and are trying to get their money's worth, or quirky tunes to imply your company is hip and happening. My favourite one was an internet service provider who used Copacabana; funny the first time, less funny the tenth.

Whatever hold music they're using it will be interrupted every 15 seconds by someone informing you that your call is important and someone will answer any second. Why do they bother with that? Do people actually get scared by the hold music? "Oh no! London Electricity have accidentally connected me to Classic FM!" The only useful ones are those that tell you your place in the queue, it's worth paying attention to these as on occasion I've had them go backwards and a couple of times I've come to the conclusion that the queue isn't actually moving at all and that the single person assigned to pick up the line is in fact on holiday for two weeks.

Just as you've taken a large bite of something chewy or started singing along to the music, you get to talk to a real person. Well, optimistically you do, a couple of times that I've been put through only to hear the distant sounds of the call centre but with no one on the end of my line. Then they have to identify you, this involves an account number, security number, pin and at least three stupid security questions. "What is your memorable place?" well, that would depend on when I set up the account really, "what is your memorable word?" where do you start with that one?! I realise mother's maiden name could cause confusion for some people, but come on!

Call centre staff fall into two categories - Perky Pattie who is in possession of free will or Catatonic Cathy who is in possession of a script. If you're phoning because you want to get something done Perky is really your best chance, she will make you believe that it's her life's mission to update your insurance details and she won't rest until it's done. On the flip-side if you wanted to complain about something you're going to be out of luck, because you'll feel completely guilty about ranting at poor Pattie when she is so very understanding and obviously not responsible for all your woes.

Catatonic Cathy is a perfect target for your rants and you can really take it out on her as she follows the script through until falling off the end. She will not however be much help if you want something slightly off plot as their scripts are always woefully inadequate when it comes to real life problems. You will inevitably find yourself stuck in a loop of "This should have happened", "Well it hasn't", "well it should have" repeated until the universe dies.

The upshot is it doesn't really matter which one you talk to, you're unlikely to get anything out of it. Catatonic Cathy has told you there's nothing she can do to help and at least gets bonus points for telling the truth. Perky Pattie meanwhile has promised you she will phone you right back and then never does. At least these days you clinging to a mobile instead of standing in a freezing phone box waiting for someone to phone back explaining how BT have screwed up. She'll ring back in just a couple of minutes. Any minute now...