@noonmutter / noonmutter.tumblr.com
Happy Mother’s Day.
Be mindful of how horrifically overworked restaurants, and anybody associated with restaurants (including delivery services) are going to be today. We’re already absolutely swamped by orders and customers contacting us about said orders and have been since 9:30 am.
Be nice to everyone all the time, but especially to restaurant and customer service workers today.
Wierd questions to get from a customer on our customer service chat: “Is [your website] easy to navigate?”
In a separate instance I was asked if I was a bot. I really don’t know what people think I’m going to say to that, and what they hope is going to change by asking it.
People confuse me.
If you say the words “lawsuit,” “lawyer,” or anything like “I’m gonna sue you for this,” you’ve just set me free. I’m a customer service monkey. I’m not a lawyer. I’m not even the lawyer’s receptionist. What you’ve just done is what the kids these days refer to as “playing yourself.”
See, my customer service monkey self has been very carefully trained (and I personally train my fellow customer service monkeys this way, as I am also Supreme Customer Service Monkey) not to provide commentary on legal matters. That’s just how it works.
And the second you mention lawyers? It’s a legal matter, and we lowly customer service monkeys can’t and won’t be able to help you anymore. We’re not trained! And it’ll hurt your case! Wouldn’t want that.
So next time you think you’ll be able to bully a full refund out of me or any of my fellow customer service monkeys by threatening to call some nebulous lawyer you probably actually don’t have and who, in the unlikely event you do have one on retainer, would laugh maniacally and hang up on you if you told them you wanted to sue a delivery company because the restaurant forgot your pickles... maybe just shut up and eat your damn burger instead.
For context, I’m not just whining that people are meaner than usual (even though they are--BE NICE TO THE CUSTOMER SERVICE REPS, WE’RE AT LEAST AS SCREWED AS YOU ARE), or that it’s been kinda busy.
I’m talking on a day when we expected and staffed for about 500 calls (not taking into account emails or chats), we got 824. Eight hundred and twenty-four. If all of those calls were about three minutes long, that’s 41 hours and change of calls in a one-day span. And a lot of ‘em are mean as fuck because some people went cabin fevery in a real damn hurry. This has been the case for about a week now, as I look back over the numbers.
I had somebody threaten to sue because they didn’t get a refund on a two-week-old order from a chinese restaurant because a pint of steamed rice was allegedly missing. I’ve been called incompetent, heartless, and any number of other things, and while ordinarily, I can let these things slide, I simply haven’t had the time, because they’ve been happening rapid-fire since this whole COVID mess started. There is almost no relaxation to be found.
We are tired. I am tired.
Be nice to the people who are still working. We’re all human too and man, we’re tired.
today needs to just stop
people are being super jackassy and I am expending more effort than you can possibly imagine not saying things like “has it occurred to you that you are a dumbass” or “merry fucking christmas to you too” all day
If you send us furious rants in all-caps, we will probably take care of you last. If you send us multiple messages about the exact same thing, or just copy and paste the same thing over and over in hopes of annoying us into action, fun fact we have a ‘select all’ function and will close all the extras as duplicates and you’ll still have to wait your turn like everyone else. We are become Malicious Compliance, destroyers of entitled shitheads’ days.
Be patient and don’t be a douche. Typing in all-caps is you trying to scream at us and it’s an even more impotent action in text than it already was.
Also if you like something we did, please take five seconds to tell us so. We hear that so rarely that chances are good you’ll make somebody cry, because we’re more prepared for being bitched at than complimented.
Guy chats in while either logged into their account or after having provided the email for their account; either way, all their information populated for me automatically
This account has orders back as far as the beginning of July
First thing he says: "Hello I'm a new customer" (for those of you keeping track, that’s lie #1)
Second thing he says: "I just made an account and I was promised free delivery for a month but it's not working" (that’s also a lie in the form of feigning ignorance in hopes of getting something you’re not entitled to, kids!)
Me: "various questions that I'm only asking to make absolutely sure he hangs himself" (because it’s fun and also because I’m not supposed to come right out the gate with “You’re lying, badly” unless I’m absolutely 100% sure)
Me: "So I'm seeing that an active account exists that has the exact same spelling of your very unique name"
Guy: "..."
Chat window: *chat has been ended by visitor*
Me: *cheerfully humming a little ditty while banning and notating the hell out of both his accounts*
I’m just chock full of helpful tips from customer service reps this week
on that note
if you want help quickly
do not send a dozen messages, especially not where each is more hostile than the last, when the first one doesn’t get a response right away
regardless of how urgent your need is, you’re just cramming the backlog more full and making it take longer to get to your thing. you’re not helping. you’re only yelling into the void. in most cases, all but one of your messages will be flagged as a duplicate anyway so just shut up and wait your turn
we are straight up trying to be fast, we don’t enjoy taking forever; the only ones who might potentially enjoy that are the ones that don’t care about remaining employed and/or don’t have to deal with the resultant shrieking of the unreasonable hordes
another pro tip from a CS rep:
if you’re going to complain that you’ve been waiting way too long, make sure you get your timestamps right, because we can count, and nothing you say will make the span of 4:42 to 5:12 magically become an hour
=_=
if a customer service rep asks you “is there anything else I can do for you today” or anything along that vein, they are basically asking you if they can stop talking to you and end the conversation. do not be that dickhead who says “no” and then immediately asks another question
doing this once because you genuinely forgot to ask something is fine
doing it over and over and over in the same conversation means you aren’t listening to what the rep is asking you and you’re being a dickhead
“is there anything else” = “my brain is tired and I want to leave this plane”
I just had to listen to a guy ramble at us about how incompetent we are as a company. He's already cancelled his account, it's already offline, and he still wants a call from the "highest person in the company" about it. Every time I tried to ask him what he actually intended to accomplish in that phone call he'd just start his complaints over again.
At one point he put me on hold to deal with a customer, and I was treated to a five-minute argument between him and a very, very white dude in favor of Trump (I could hear them both, super clearly, the entire time). I knew I was in for a treat when I heard “You know what I read in Time? Trump’s IQ is the second-highest of any president ever.” I died inside and waited for actual death to come but it didn't. The reaper failed me. Five minutes of “are you gonna show me your tax returns” and “Hillary is a communist,” just so the restaurant guy could come back to be unproductive some more.
After he came back, I asked him point blank what he actually wanted out of a call back after pointing out everything he'd already said, and he just started complaining again, then said he needed to put me on hold again and hung up.
By the way the crux of his problem was that we were charging half prices for half-toppings on pizzas.
I want those ten minutes back.
...who take a second to wish me a merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah, happy holidays, or any other sort of wintertime celebration pleasantry: Thank you.
...who are patient and civil (at least), even though their day has sucked because they know mine has sucked too, because all I do is talk to people who’ve been having a sucky day: Thank you.
...who actually say “thank you for your help” to us and mean it: Thank you.
...who make the effort to fill out a feedback survey just to tell our bosses that we’re awesome and we made your entire experience better: Thank you.
...who happily say things like “you just restored my faith in your company” without hesitation: Thank you.
Sincerely, A customer service rep who works on holidays and weekends
