Confessions of a Call Center Gal

Twenty





“I’m on the phone!” I cry when Kars barges into my room.

“Still?” she groans and slams the door.

Mika and I resume talking.

“So...” I nibble my inner lip. “You were saying?”

He clears his throat. “I’m sorry if I scared you off with the Valentine gift but—”

I interject, “Wait! What are you talking about? I loved my gift; I thought it was the most thoughtful gift ever.”

“Really?” he says, seemingly surprised. “Then why have you been avoiding me?”

“I haven’t been avoiding you.”

“Yeah you have.” There is a slight hard edge to his voice.

I hesitate, “I just felt confused...about things.”

“What things?” he probes.

I wipe my sweaty palms on my jeans. I certainly don’t want to come across like some fatal-attraction-bunny-in-the-stew-pot sort of woman.

“I...err, saw you with Tatiana,” I say in an attempt to gauge his feelings for her.

“Oh, you know Tatiana? She’s a sweetheart isn’t she?”

I find myself laughing hysterically. “Sweetheart?!?”

He adds, “I know she’s a bit different, but she’s grown on me.”

“Um-hmmmm,” I mummer with a trace of sarcasm, but Mika entirely misses it.

Yeah, I bet she’s grown on him—like a colony of e-coli bacteria that grows on a raw chicken carcass. She’s toxic!

“I’ve been giving her a ride to work. She lives on campus and she doesn’t own a car,” he says, still oblivious to the hate vibes I’m emanating through the phone.

Humph. From what I’ve heard, she has a DUI. That’s why she can’t drive. Tatiana has certainly got the wool pulled over Mika’s eyes if he seems to think she’s all THAT.

“Maddy, are you still there?”

“Yeah, I am.” I grind my teeth to keep from saying, “Tatiana is a snarky bitch! Why can’t you see that?”

“So...” he trails off.

“So...” I echo. “Um, is that the extent of your relationship with Tatiana?” As much as I try to keep my voice steady, it falters.

I know that it’s best to get it all out in the open, but a part of me is afraid to hear his answer. My stomach is in knots.

“What are you talking about?” He sounds a bit affronted.

There is a taut silence. My nails dig sharply into my palms.

Eventually, he says in a low and deliberate voice, “No, I am not dating her, if that’s what you mean.”

I cover the receiver so he can’t hear me whooping, “WOOT! WOOT! Mika is not dating that Orange Slut with Split Ends!”

“Madison,” he breathes my name, “are you jealous of her? Because there’s really noth—”

“NO!” I interject forcefully. “No,” I repeat softly. “Of course not. I mean…we’re just friends, right?”

“Yeah,” he says simply. “Friends.”

Flopping back onto my pillow, I close my eyes in exasperation. “Of course...” I bite my inner lip, disappointment striking me like a blow in the stomach.

“So, are we okay now?” he asks softly.

A hint of a smile touches my lips. “We’re okay.”

“Maddy, I’ll stop giving her a ride to work if it bothers you.”

“Pssh! Why would it bother me? She’s a sweetheart, right?” I almost gag in the process. “So give her a ride. I don’t care.”

But inside, I do care. I’m afraid she’ll cast him under some voodoo spell of hers.

After a hesitant pause, he asks, “You sure?”

“Positive,” I say and clear my throat. “So, um what else do you think of Tatiana?” I ask in an innocent voice. “I mean, I know you think she’s a sweetheart and all that, but do you think she’s pretty too?”

“I don’t think about her. Period,” he says with such force and conviction it takes me by surprise.

Good answer. It is the answer I’ve been longing to hear. So I brush Tatiana off as just a minor hiccup in our fledging friendship.

We talk for hours, exchanging tidbits of this and that, covering every moment of our brief time apart. Burning up the minutes on our cell phones, we tacitly avoid any mention of Tatiana.





Unbeknownst to me, when I bragged on my resume that I was an excellent multitasker, I would actually turn out to become one; wonders never cease! Working in this call center has turned me into a multitasking queen. Here’s an example:

Beep!

“Thanks for calling Lightning Speed Communications. This is Maddy. How can I help you?” I ask, while reading chapter eight of The Da Vinci Code. MUTE.

Then I listen to the caller, read a paragraph and crunch on a Hershey’s bar. After taking a moment to chew and swallow, I release the MUTE key. “I’ll be happy to assist with that,” I say briskly.

And if I get a caller who just wants to bitch, moan and listen to himself talk forever and a day, just like this caller that I have on the line right now, well all the better!

I jab the MUTE button, tune him out and read several more paragraphs. This part is juicy! Langdon has solved another enigmatic riddle and the Priory of Sion are on to him.

In the past few months, I’ve read the entire Shopaholic series, The Hunger Games trilogy, Khaled Hosseini’s novels, Paullina Simon’s The Bronze Horseman and all its sequels, Nicholas Sparks’ tear-jerkers, Jodi Picoult’s controversial books, and now Dan Brown’s mind gripping thrillers.

The problem is, Dan Brown has got me gung-ho on conspiracy theories—the secret brotherhood of the Illuminati, the fraternal order of the Freemasons. So riveting and such fascinating stuff.

And truth be told, I think there’s a conspiracy going on in this call center. Last week, this company spent millions of moolahs buying up air time space on TV and radio to launch their new ad campaign. Their new slogan: Lightning Speed Communications, We Service All Your Needs in Lightning Time.

Groan. I know. It is so stooooopid!

I brushed off that silly ad campaign, but I really should have paid more attention. It was the purveyor of bad things to come.

Today, everyone on the floor received this apocalyptic email:



From: Corporate Headquarters

To: All Customer Service/ Tech Support Agents.

Subject: Our new ad campaign.



We have proudly launched our new ad campaign—We Service All Your Needs in Lightning Time. In order for our campaign to be a success, we will focus on your AHT (Average Handle Time). This is something that all the Team Leads and Supervisors will be watching out for. If they see that your call goes over 2 minutes, they will come and check on you. We will also be watching Not Ready since every second of Not Ready will increase your AHT, and you should typically never be in Not Ready for more than 5 seconds. Keep in mind that the AHT goal is 2 minutes. Please adhere to this policy; failure to do so will result in an informal warning, followed by a formal written warning, and subsequent termination. Thank you for all your hard work.



Siegfried Miles, CEO

Corporate HQ



I stare at the appalling email. “My AHT is seven minutes,” I cry. “What’s yours, Truong?”

“Mine’s six.” He exhales sharply. “We are so f*cked.”

I pound my fist on the desk. “I got another relay call today so that will jack up my handle time!”

“Next time you get a relay call, just hang up.” Truong plonks a maki roll in his mouth.

I nibble my lips. “I’ll get fired if I get caught…”

“Well, that’s what I’ll do,” says Truong. “Hang up on the handicapped to save my job.”

My conscience immediately kicks in. “But I really don’t want to hang up on them. It’s not their fault that they are deaf or dumb, I mean mute,” I hastily correct myself. “Don’t you think dumb is such a degrading word?”

“You can call them whatever you want.” He sniggers. “They can’t answer you back!”

“Truong! You are going to Hell in a handbasket.”

Lurching forward, I playfully tug his scarf and he theatrically feigns his death. After goofing around, the reality of the situation begins to sink in.

“What they’re asking us to do is impossible,” he implores.

“I know! Troubleshooting takes time. Listening to customers’ complaints takes time, selling takes time. Let me have another one of those Spider rolls.” I reach across with my chopsticks and plunk a roll in my mouth.

Truong strokes an imaginary Confucius beard. “Just you wait and see. When they find out that no one can meet this ridiculous ‘two minute AHT goal,’ they will change it!” he proffers.





A week goes by and the Average Handle Time is still stuck at two minutes. It’s near pandemonium; everyone is in a wild panic. The AHT for the entire call center hovers at six minutes, give or take a minute. I know this for a fact because management sends out everyone’s stats on a daily basis. Last week, the overall AHT for this center was 6.5 minutes.

And they want us to drop it down to 2 minutes?

Are they loco?

“Truong! What will they do? Fire everybody?”

“I don’t know.” He fidgets with his scarf. “I don’t want to lose my job. Heck, it’s a full blown recession now.”

“Hell, if I lose mine, it’ll be a depression.”

A shadow of a frown touches his forehead. “They have to lower the handle time.”

“They won’t,” I say glumly. “I heard this rumor that they can’t lower it. In that stupid ad campaign, the caption says we service all calls in two minutes or less. So they can’t retract the ad now; it’s too late! They’ve already spent way too much money.”

Truong shakes his head at the company’s sheer idiocy. “Well, they’ll have to do something.”





And then it happened.

On Tuesday morning, the server crashed. All our systems are down. Kaput. I cannot log in to a single app. Not one!

It is complete bedlam and utter chaos in here. Armageddon.

All the supervisors and leads are running around in circles like the sky is falling, screaming out orders, “Use down scripts! Use down scripts!”

Beep!

“Thank you for calling Lightning Speed. I’m so sorry, but our systems are currently down. Is there a general question that I can help you with?”

“Nope,” says the caller and promptly hangs up.

Beep!

And on and on and on it goes.

I use ‘Down Scripts’ on every single call, while simultaneously reading The Da Vinci Code. This is fantastic! I don’t even have to use one ounce of my brain to think and troubleshoot.

I can just read my novel and repeat the same sentence over and over again, like a broken tape recorder.

Sometimes, just for shits and giggles, I make sure I sound extra robotic so the callers think they’re talking to an automated attendant and hang up. This is too good to be true.

Suddenly, Hillary barks over my shoulder, “You cannot say that our systems are down, you are supposed to say that our systems are UNAVAILABLE. That is the mandatory script.”

I blink.

She continues frenetically, “If you say that our systems are down, it causes undue panic. Like if there is a bomb on the plane, the pilot does not tell the passengers that there is a bomb on board. He merely informs them that there is ‘a situation’. Same thing here! Our systems are NOT DOWN! And if you tell the callers that our systems are down, you will get a big fat zero on your quality scores!”

“Got it. The systems are unavailable,” I say to placate her.

She forges on, “And if the callers ask when our systems will be back up, let them know that we do not have an ETA.”

I smile and nod obediently.

Beep!

“Thank you for calling Lightning Speed. I’m so sorry but our systems are currently unavailable. Is there a general question I can help you with?”

“So your systems are down,” states the caller.

“Um, no sir. Our systems are unavailable.”

“Yeah, so they’re down,” insists the caller.

“No,” I protest. “They’re unavailable.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” he demands.

“It means our systems are not available.”

He makes an exasperated sound. “When will it be back up?”

“Sorry sir, we don’t have an ETA.”

“Now what does that mean?” he huffs.

“It’s an abbreviation for Estimated Time of Arrival.”

Sheesh. Now we’re supposed to talk like air traffic controllers.

Hmm, shouldn’t it be ETR? Estimated Time of Repair?

Click!

Aside from that snafu, it has been a rather swell day at work; and by the end of my shift, I’ve finished reading the entire novel.

Before logging off, I check my stats report.

Holy Sacred Indian Cow! My Average Handle Time for today is eight seconds! And that bumps up my overall handle time to two minutes!

“Truong!” I cry excitedly. “Have you checked your stats yet?”

“Sure have, darling. I love it when the server goes down; makes my stats look fab.”

My eyes narrow suspiciously. “Do you think they rigged it?”

Truong stares at me in blank astonishment. “What the hell are you talking about?”

I say in a hushed voice, “I think they planned this! They made the server crash on purpose to help improve our handle time.”

How sneaky! I am amazed by their shrewdness.

This is so surreal. And what a brilliant idea!

“It’s a conspiracy,” I hiss.

“Maddy,” he says mildly, “quit reading those silly Dan Brown novels.”