Max: Blah, Blah et Blah Encore
My alarm went off at 9. I muttered my usual Thursday morning obscenities. Tuesday and Wednesday are my weekend so Thursday is my Monday. The work week is too long, and the weekend far too short.
Part of my new fitness regime (half-assed as it is) involves cutting back on my beloved fizzy caffeine. So, without benefit of my usual morning fuel, I showered, ate and dragged my ass to work. It says something about the scheduling issues we have right now that I took about 5 calls from 11:30 to 5:30, and about 20 from 5:30 to 8:00. During days we are so overstaffed that we get 45-60 minutes between calls. During evenings we are so understaffed that there are often 45-60 calls in queue.
Usually when it is slow, my supervisor will have me do email support. Email support is good and bad. It is good because I get to be off the phones. It's bad because when I am on the phone those 45-60 minute gaps between calls can be spent reading or surfing. While on email support, it is nothing but answering emails.
The emails themselves fall into 3 categories. The first are legitimate requests for help. We have preformatted responses for most common technical issues and these are dealt with quickly and easily. They comprise about 10% of the overall volume.
The second are moronic request for help. Like emails that say, "My email doesn't work." Another example, and my personal favorite, was the email that said, in its entirety, "I keep getting the error." These take a little more cunning as we try to devise a way to ask the emailler just what the fuck they are shooting for, while taking care not to call attention to their obvious stupidity. These comprise about 20% of the volume.
Third, and comprising the remaining 70% of the volume are cranks who are hoping that the people who answer the emails are both higher in rank and lower in IQ than the people who answer the phones. Usually they will have already called in and they are complaining that the evil, awful, horrible person who answered the phone tried to troubleshoot their problem rather than just admit that we were fucking with his service for shits and grins. Or the person who is shocked, shocked, that we would be so incompetent as to cut off his service just because he hasn't paid his bill for four months. Of course, the only reasonable course of action, in their opinion, is for the rep who informed him that we will turn back on his service if he paid his bill, and the supervisor who actually agreed with the rep, be fired immediately. Then we must immediately give him at least three months of free service (in addition to erasing the overdue charges) if we are to have any hope of him considering keeping us as his provider.
Oy.
Today, however, it was so slow that the email support had already been done. So, I was forced to chill for extended periods of time between calls. At least until the vast majority of the other reps clocked out just in time for the phones to go nuts.
After that, it was home, tuna helper and some TV. Likely, the same pattern will hold true through Monday, so don't be too surprised if these "day in the life" posts dry up a bit until the weekend. But I am sure if we asked Jer nicely to do his own day in the life posts, he would be only too happy to tell us all to fuck off and die.
Part of my new fitness regime (half-assed as it is) involves cutting back on my beloved fizzy caffeine. So, without benefit of my usual morning fuel, I showered, ate and dragged my ass to work. It says something about the scheduling issues we have right now that I took about 5 calls from 11:30 to 5:30, and about 20 from 5:30 to 8:00. During days we are so overstaffed that we get 45-60 minutes between calls. During evenings we are so understaffed that there are often 45-60 calls in queue.
Usually when it is slow, my supervisor will have me do email support. Email support is good and bad. It is good because I get to be off the phones. It's bad because when I am on the phone those 45-60 minute gaps between calls can be spent reading or surfing. While on email support, it is nothing but answering emails.
The emails themselves fall into 3 categories. The first are legitimate requests for help. We have preformatted responses for most common technical issues and these are dealt with quickly and easily. They comprise about 10% of the overall volume.
The second are moronic request for help. Like emails that say, "My email doesn't work." Another example, and my personal favorite, was the email that said, in its entirety, "I keep getting the error." These take a little more cunning as we try to devise a way to ask the emailler just what the fuck they are shooting for, while taking care not to call attention to their obvious stupidity. These comprise about 20% of the volume.
Third, and comprising the remaining 70% of the volume are cranks who are hoping that the people who answer the emails are both higher in rank and lower in IQ than the people who answer the phones. Usually they will have already called in and they are complaining that the evil, awful, horrible person who answered the phone tried to troubleshoot their problem rather than just admit that we were fucking with his service for shits and grins. Or the person who is shocked, shocked, that we would be so incompetent as to cut off his service just because he hasn't paid his bill for four months. Of course, the only reasonable course of action, in their opinion, is for the rep who informed him that we will turn back on his service if he paid his bill, and the supervisor who actually agreed with the rep, be fired immediately. Then we must immediately give him at least three months of free service (in addition to erasing the overdue charges) if we are to have any hope of him considering keeping us as his provider.
Oy.
Today, however, it was so slow that the email support had already been done. So, I was forced to chill for extended periods of time between calls. At least until the vast majority of the other reps clocked out just in time for the phones to go nuts.
After that, it was home, tuna helper and some TV. Likely, the same pattern will hold true through Monday, so don't be too surprised if these "day in the life" posts dry up a bit until the weekend. But I am sure if we asked Jer nicely to do his own day in the life posts, he would be only too happy to tell us all to fuck off and die.
posted by Max Dobberstein at 5/26/2005 11:03:00 PM
6 Comments:
Fuck off and die.
Can't you just feel the love, folks?
Are you two having a lover's quarrel?
No. We've always been like this.
He said I would ... so I did!
At least someone listens to me.
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