Automated phone system (many explicatives)

[ddbach]

Dad misplaced his checkbook and my sister and I were unable to find it so we closed the acct and opened a new one (sigh). He had been someplace everyday for the past week including out of town for 2 days so it could have been almost anywhere Found this week in a box of envelopes in his car!?

Changing his pension deposit took one phone call to a local office to a real person. His automated withdrawals were also easily switched.

Social Security has been an exercise in frustration. As this adventure started I developed the worst case of laryngitis I've ever had. Dad had trouble hearing the automated system so we had it on speaker phone and I'm trying to walk him through it, then it wasn't hearing him correctly and threw us out. My sister walked in with some things for dad so we recruited her to be our voice. The system could hear her correctly until it got to "say and spell your mother's maiden name" We said D----- it read back "B*****", no, D-----, "B*****",(repeat several more times), "I'm sorry I'm having so much trouble" and throws us out of the system again. We've tried multiple times more in the last ten days and it can't get the letter D in that particular spot. It catches the D at the start of our last name just fine so why it won't at that step is puzzling and wildly annoying. Coughing will throw you out of the system too. I've never wanted to reach through the phone and choke "someone" so much before. I even dropped the F bomb as I hung up in frustration the last few times. in addition to all the bad words I was thinking while trying to do this and later said out loud once my voice started coming back.

You can somehow eventually get a real person between 7a - 7p M-F but I haven't made it out of work early enough to do this with dad yet. I have today off so I'll take him to the local Social Security office and sit in line to try to get a real face to face person to fix this.

What did the gov't paperwork reduction people estimate the above should have taken? 10 minutes. I'm closing in on 2 hours. Who knows how long we'll be stuck at the SS office today with it being the end of the month. If dad had let me set him up with the 7 digit computer password this would have been much less painful but just convincing him to do direct deposit was a victory.

Thank you for letting me vent so I can remain civil later.

[pete3799]

Don't even get me started on automated phone systems.
If these company's would hire a real human to answer the phone the economy would benefit greatly.

[Scuba Steve]

When I get an automated phone system that tries doing voice recognition to lead me to things I'm not calling about I usually get by it by blowing into the phone or some other loud noise.

"Please say what department you're calling for. For example, I'd like a home loan. Or I'd like to open a checking account."
wwwshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhheeeeeeeeeeeeee eeeeewwwwwwwwwwwww

"... I'm having trouble understand"
BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURP!!!

"... Transferring you to an operator, please wait."

It's juvenile, but very effective.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Originally Posted by pete3799

Don't even get me started on automated phone systems.
If these company's would hire a real human to answer the phone the economy would benefit greatly.

If these companies hired real humans to answer the phones, their profits and stock prices would suffer.

Sorry but that's the reality. I hate ("despise" is probably more accurate) automated phone systems too, but the reality is people are far too expensive to pay them to do jobs that robots/computers/machines can do. A base automated phone system is a couple of thousand bucks. Even a minimum-wage employee costs a company tens of thousands annually, plus the cost of administration, plus the cost of their benefits, plus dealing with their fickle idiosyncrasies ("I don't want to work next Thursday", "so-and-so got more hours than me, why?", "I have to leave early", etc.

[Scuba Steve]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

...I hate ("despise" is probably more accurate) automated phone systems too, but the reality is people are far too expensive to pay them to do jobs that robots/computers/machines can do...

The voice activated ones do it half-assed, at best. The Push 1 for (whatever), Eumpje el 2 para Deutsch, ... ones sucked less.

[T77911S]

try pressing "0", that usually gets you to an operator. or just keep hitting buttons.

[speeder]

I love to vent at them, get some frustrations out w/o actually harming a live human. It usually gets me transfered to a live operator as well, by then my anger has been vented and I can be courteous and pleasant.

"No, 'D' not 'B' you pig-fking, **#%$(#+**@&&#&^&#!!!!!"

No one gets hurt and you feel much better. The system also shorts-out trying to keep up/understand and you get transfered to an operator. No muss, no fuss.

[BGCarrera32]

I would have tried saying B instead of D.

[ddbach]

Success at last!
Called from dad's place one last time before going in person. Did finally get an actual person but while on hold they torture you with the question that you have repeatedly got wrong. It did catch the D one time but then changed an M to an N so still wrong. that's okay dad returned the favor with rambling answers to the focused questions directed to him despite my promptings from the background until the agent finally asked Dad if it was okay for me to speak to the agent for him. We finished in several short sentences

Next adventure - Road trip with my Dad and sister starting Sunday. At least her power steering went out so I've been saved from her driving in Chicago. We're taking my car
Indianapolis Speedway Museum, Corvette Museum and Air Force Museum

[Zeke]

I wrote a letter to SS and all that was needed to be handled was handled in 7 days. I write letters (on forms if possible) as much as possible to any large entity.

When calling anyone that has automated phones I give as little info as possible and keep hitting "0" or asking for "agent." They just make you repeat all that you entered anyway, so why waste time? If the 0 and agent requests don't work, find out what does. Sometimes it's just saying "other" over and over.

[UconnTim97]

Originally Posted by scuba steve

when i get an automated phone system that tries doing voice recognition to lead me to things i'm not calling about i usually get by it by blowing into the phone or some other loud noise.

"please say what department you're calling for. For example, i'd like a home loan. Or i'd like to open a checking account."
wwwshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhheeeeeeeeeeeeee eeeeewwwwwwwwwwwww

"... I'm having trouble understand"
buuuuuuuuuuuuuuurp!!!

"... Transferring you to an operator, please wait."

it's juvenile, but very effective.

+1

[ddbach]

Milt - Our last mail encounter with the Social Security machine was not so quick or sucessful as yours or I would have gone that route.

On getting to a real person/agent the biggest issue was timing. Dad and I needed to be in the same place so the gov't worker would talk to me for him. I wasn't getting out of work til 8pm or later. By then only the automated system was working, the real people had gone home. Would be nice if the automated system could handle texting the spellings but probably $$$ for software change.