Holiday Customer Service Hell.

[cignus_pfaccari]

My company does insurance reimbursement hotlines. We're the ones you wind up calling if you want to find out if your insurance covers this drug; either your doctor has you fill out a form in the office (that he faxes to us), gives you our number to call, or you see one of the ads on TV and call in and get over to us somehow.

Now, as in every hotline, 99.9% of calls are relatively normal and pain-free. However, you occasionally get the just plain insane...

Like, on this transplant hotline, this patient calls, furious, that we sent her an application that was pre-filled.

Me: "Well, ma'am, we do that so you don't have to, and then you can correct anything that needs correcting."

Patient: "I don't like people putting my stuff on any paper. Send me a blank one."

Me: "I'm sorry, but we're not able to generate any blank applications. We can only generate them pre-filled." (At this point, yes...we had no way of printing out a blank application...seriously.)

Patient: "Well, I'm not going to fill this out. And you'll get yours when I die because you murdered me!"

Me: "..."

Patient: "You're going to go to hell for that, you know!"

Me: "...I'm sorry if you feel that way, ma'am. But if you want assistance, you have to follow the procedures we've set in place to do so."

Patient: (click)

This, of course, does not get into the discussion about notarizing her income documentation (since, after all, people can have other sources of income than Social Security...). Sigh.

Brad

 

[Argent Silvermage]

My Heart goes out to you Brad.
I used to work for AARP insurance. Goddess knows I got to hate the elderly after about 6 months of that job.

I remember one guy who would call in and demand to speak to me and me only. the reason for this is I reminded him of his son (we sounded alike) but he hated his son so all he would do was unload his stress at me and then hang up.
Eventually when my boss heard one of his tirades for themselves (I was being monitered at the time) they had his number blocked.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

I would be glad I even had one. I mean so what if it doesnt taste real, just go eat some doritos and drink mountain dew while you are using it, then you will taste SOMETHING.

Talk around the office was tuna...(sorry if I offend)

 

[nakia]

Here's a question: how do you feel about returning merchandise after 30 days and getting your money back? The reason I ask is, at the bookstore I worked at, we had the standard "30 days with receipt" policy. If you wanted your money back, you had to return the book within 30 days with receipt. We had a very liberal "non-receipt" policy. If we carried the book, at all, ever (or if any store -- I worked for a large chain) carried the book, you could get store credit or exhange it, even if you did not have the receipt.

I had a woman get very angry when she bought Christmas presents in September and wanted to know if she could return them in January and get her money back. When I told her no, she got upset and asked to speak with the manager. The manager basicly had to write her a note saying "she has my permission to return these items for a refund whenever she wants."

The money only until 30 days policy is for inventory and loss prevention (i.e. theft) reasons. Granted, it's not like books "expire." But some times you just have to suck it up and admit you got the wrong thing, no?

 

[Zudrak]

When I worked at a supermarket, Thanksgiving was our "big" holiday. One year, on the day before Thanksgiving, all the fresh turkeys were sold out. The frozen ones started flying off the shelves until just one was left. Two women were literally fighting over it in the aisle. I'm thinking, "It's 5pm the day before. How in the heck are you going to get that frozen solid turkey ready for tomorrow. Go buy a turkey breast and cut your losses!" Sheesh.

One woman left with the turkey, the other left with a black eye and a coupon.

-----

Remembered another good one:

While working dairy at the aforementioned supermarket, a little old man asks me for a quart of skim milk. Our milk supplier comes late on Mondays, so I tell him we are out. He grimaces. I apologize to him, saying we don't have any more. His reply? "Yes, you do! I know you do!" I said, "Sir, you are more than welcome to come with me to the back room and check out the dairy box yourself. But you will find, as I did when I clocked in this morning, that we are out of most milk at this time." I don't know why, but that didn't satisfy him.

 

[DungeonmasterCal]

For a year, I managed a video store that was part of a regional chain here in the south. During that time, I:

Had a woman throw her wallet at me and accuse me of putting late fees on her rentals on purpose.

Had a guy offer me money to erase his membership information but still allow him to rent movies. His reason? The GUBBAMENT (his word) was tracking his viewing habits because he "knew too much" and was afraid he'd be found.

Had a tweeked-up meth addict offer me oral sex if I'd let her rent movies for free.

Had a kid threaten to beat me up because I wouldn't let him exchange a PS2 game for one that "wasn't so hard".

Had a woman physically threaten me because we rented "R" rated movies to her kid. When I showed her the signature on the ticket was hers, she got even madder and told me I was not doing my job to police what children watch, because she was too busy to keep up with their viewing habits.

A man threatened me because his son had over $40 dollars of late fees on his account (and 40 bux was NOTHING compared to some). He felt it unfair that he was prohibited from renting because of his son's fines. I tried to explain it was company policy, not mine, and he begin screaming and banging his fists on the counter, then stormed out. Less than 30 seconds later, a local police officer comes in to return his movies. I made the joke about "never a cop around when you need one", and explained what happened. He asked the customer's name, then started laughing. Turns out, this guy had been laying really low and the cops couldn't find him to serve him and his son a warrant for drug trafficking (meth). He was arrested less than 10 minutes later.

Word got around (and I'm sure the cop had something to do with this) that people were being arrested for having late fees. My collection quotas jumped dramatically.

 

[Talmun]

I work the help desk for a company that produces both software and hardware for manipulating video...

I had one guy ask me if the alignment of the stars (yes, the ones in the sky) was important to the operation of his hardware.

As I was reading off a new serial number to another customer, I was saying 'hyphen' in-between each group of numbers...he asked me if it was an upper-case or lower-case hyphen.

Another customer called needing a serial number, I put him on hold while I generated it, and when I picked the phone back up, I asked if he had a pen ready. He said "Hold on, I'm not near one right now..." I was then treated to the sound of a grunt and then a few seconds later, the flush of a toilet. I bearly kept it together, thank god for mute.

There are, of course, many others, but these three are recent, and fun

 

[Mystery Man]

Idiot 2: The customer had purchased a ‘realistic’ artificial female body part (starts with a V I’m being good for Eric’s Grandma). He wanted to send it back because…. “It don’t taste real.”
Argent.

OMG I almost passed out I was laughing so hard.

 

[der_kluge]

These are just great. Working retail can suck a lot, but it can have its moments.

I worked at a Wal-Mart in college, and this guy stopped me in the aisle to ask me a question. He had one boots, spurs, chaps, a belt with a big buckle, a vest, gloves, and a cowboy hat - all quite worn, and dusty. He asked me if we sold "tack". I'll never forget that guy.

I worked in Hardware, and I'd get people asking me all the time if we sold: carpet, tile, linoleum and even lumber!

Some lady came in with a paint swatch (the little pieces of cardboard in the display) from Sherwan Williams. This was in the days before those fancy color-matching devices. I told her it was from Sherwan Williams, and I wouldn't have the recipe for the the color she wanted in my book. Her reply was that she couldn't read, and didn't know.

Then there was the time this guy had me mix canary yellow for his ceiling. I'd pay to see that!

 

[Argent Silvermage]

Today's Morons.

1) The customer called in and said that he had purchased a movie a few weeks ago and there was something wrong with it.
After searching for his information I found the he had bought the movie 7 MONTHS ago. He said he had just gotten around to watching it and found it was scratched.
I explained that we have a 30 day return policy and he started shreaking incoherantly about how his kid likes to watch porn before bed and this is the only disk the kid will watch.
I immediatly place him on hold and laughed so hard I got dizzy.

When I got back on the line I asked him how old his son was and he told me he was 13. I asked if he (the son) was mentaly impared in some way to explain this behavior. the father said no he just lets the kid do what ever he wants. I just said it would not be happening but if he wanted to order a replacement I would be more than happy to fill it. He wisely hung up the phone.

2) (god help me I wanted to hunt this idiot down.) This guy placed an order for 1,564 dollars worth of porn. His check bounces.

He calls up and asks where his order is. I explain that the check bounced and we would need a money order from him in order to ship. He asks why we didn't ship it COD. I explained that we don't do that. He told me that if I didn't send him his porn he would kill me and my wife (being a gay man I just said. OK kill the B!tch) he tried to get me to think that he knew who I was and where I lived and (thankfuly we have all calls monitored.) was going to come to Philly to kill me. I told him I not only knew who he was but had access to his credit and social security information. I then explained that with the recording of his threats to me the police in Montgomery Alabama would be at his home in about 5 minutes.

Strangely he hung up.