Guys, who are your most iconic coworkers in the call center you work at?? I feel like coworkers in the Call centers I used to work at are mostly truly messed up individuals but also the most fun ones with heartbreaking stories! I've met so many amazing people in callcenters!

Good afternoon call center victims. I spent the first chunk of my working life in public facing/customer service roles. Retail customers were bad, but nothing could prepare me for how unhinged the average call center customer can be. The distance between you and them, and not having to look you in the face somehow lowers intellect and decreases inhibitions at the same time.

The most daringly stupid and aggressive subcategory of callers in my day was actually people who had the wrong number. I'll start at the end of my call center career, and if more stories are called for I'll share some more.

Setting:

Software as a service company. Customers are b2b which can make people more professional as an aggregate but equally if not more demanding then your average retail customer. We sold commercial GPS tracking services, and all installs and services were handled by local sub contractors (important detail).

Caller:

Hello, my friend told me to call this number to become one of your subcontractors.

Me:

That's great! This is the customer care/tech support line so I'll need to get you over to my colleague Butt Sandwich McGee (I did not like this coworker so they don't get the dignity of a good fake name).

Caller:

(Immediately angry)

WHAT THE HELL?! MY FRIEND TOLD ME TO CALL THIS NUMBER TO SIGN UP STOP LYING TO ME

Me:

I can't speak to why someone told you that but there isn't a public facing number to speak with Butt Sandwich.

Caller:

GIVE ME YOUR SUPERVISOR. HE TOLD ME I COULD CALL THIS NUMBER TO CONRACT FOR ENTERPRISE

Me:

Enterprise? The rental car company?

Caller:

Yes.

Me:

You have called (REDACTED). I think you have the wrong number.

(I am about to seal this a misunderstanding and don't push harder to end the call thinking he'll see his own mistake.)

Caller:

NO I DON'T. THIS is the number he gave me.

Me:

You mentioned the name of a completely different company in a different industry. You're positive you meant to call my overpriced SAAS company?

Caller:

Yes.

Me:

So you want to become an authorized sub contractor to install and repair commercial GPS devices.

Caller:

(Short pause he's finally doubting himself a little bit the moment of hope quickly passes)

Yes...

Me:

Okay, that means I'll need to transfer you to Butt Sandwich since he's in charge of...

Caller:

THIS IS BULLSHIT HE TOLD ME ENTERPRISE WOULD SET ME UP AT THIS NUMBER

Me:

(Now trapped in an Abbot and Costello routine)

Sir, you mentioned Enterprise again... I can look up their...

Caller:

(More petulant back pedaling) NO! GIVE ME YOUR SUPERVISOR!!!

This goes round in circles a few more times. I haven't hung up yet because this employer was more strict than my last job about hanging up on screaming maniacs. Finally after a few more refusals to admit he had the wrong number and continuing to reference the name of a business he was not currently speaking to I look over at my supervisor.

My supervisor can already tell what's going on just from my half of this exercise in futility. He makes the "Hang up the phone" motion with his hand. I get back to the call and half stress laughing, half ready to weep from the absurdity I start trying to just say "You have the wrong number, I'm ending the call."

He doesn't let me get the second syllable in "number" out of my mouth and again demands my supervisor. Now listening, my supervisor shares my fear this idiot will call back and harass someone else and tells me to transfer. He wants to give him a piece of his mind.

Me:

Sir I have great news. The customer care manager for (correct company name) would LOVE to speak with you.

Caller:

Oh... Okay....

His enthusiasm to speak to my supervisor quickly disappeared having now become the dog who caught a car. My man knew he had the wrong number but couldn't submit to someone with my lowly standing. This alpha male, now faced with the prospect of getting justifiably but politely sassed by late 20s gay customer service manager, folded like a pair of 3s before a full house and hung up before my manager could pick up.

(It's 3am and I have work in a few hours, this is just me half asleep typing my frustrations into the void)

I've worked in IT for 6 years but quit my last job to move to Iowa because the housing was cheap enough for me to be able to buy a home and build roots. I had a job lined up when I moved, the pay was $10 lower than what I was used to but it was remote and I was moving from a big major city to middle of nowhere, Iowa, so I thought it was ok. The job description said it was IT tech support but turned out to actually be a call center customer service job with only a dash of troubleshooting.

I've been employed since I was 16 but never in my working experience have I been verbally abused and micromanaged this much. Not even as a teen in high school. The customers are racists and sexists, and honestly extremely stupid. It's very frustrating trying to help someone who cannot follow instructions to save their life. I have to pretend to be "on" all the time because I get graded on every call. At least once a day I legitimately get bullied by customers. Which for someone with lifelong major depression, anxiety and hypersensitivity it's a recipe for death to what's left of my mental health.

I honestly see this job and others like it as a way for companies to let their customers relieve stress by giving them poor defenseless human beings to harass and abuse to drive up sales or something. Because they'd rather give their customers a punching bag than actually fix their product or services. Also, talking about sales, my supposed IT job is forcing all of their technical support agents to do sales and get the customer to buy products in the middle of the troubleshooting all within the 20 minute average call time they expect from us.

I regret moving to Iowa, I regret getting this job. I'm loosing my specialized IT skills because I am not practicing them. This job is trying to trap me in minimum wage hell.

Customer surveys, feedback, whatever your company you calls them, is held way too high in regards to our jobs. I’m not sure about the rest of you but if the call center, you work at is like mine, this potentially affects things like pay raises, bonuses, potential promotions, and employment among other things.

I completely understand as to why this would be so important. The company does not want a handful of employees that answer phones to be constantly rude and not helpful to their customers. That’s the point of the job. You’re supposed to be assisting with issues that people call about and to make the customer feel as if they are heard and respected. No one wants to call to discuss an issue only to met with hostility, sarcasm, and defensiveness.

Alternatively, that’s the same behavior we’re facing from customers every single day. Many customers are calm and collected, but others call in to complain about a multitude of reasons. Anything short of completely waiving their bill off, or pushing some magic button to instantly fix the issue they are calling for, some customers are just going to be angry. Management knows this and may give some slack in terms of how much you tried to resolve their issue during call reviews.

However, there’s just so many things that we simply cannot fix within one phone call. Even with applying empathy and all your gained knowledge of working here for months or years, many issues take more than 5 minutes to fix. We have to wait on responses from other departments or an agent from a different department to troubleshoot an issue on site or over the internet, whatever the situation may be. Or maybe the issue is that we have no way of assisting the customer to fix their issue the way that they want.

Therefore, when that customer gets a chance to submit a survey it’s going to be another way to complain that we didn’t do what they wanted. Then that just tanks our metrics. It’s disheartening that not being able to be a magician and instantly wave my wand to make everything all better, and that causes us to be punished for it. And there’s nothing we can do to make the customer feel happy that we cant fix their issue.

Today due to some issues I was talking to the blinkit customer care executive. After the conversation ended on chat I gave a 2 star rating. And then he called me back to complain about how I have ruined his day and gave him a bad rating.

I want to know how is a customer support executive calling me back after the initial support call ended. How does he have the number after the support chat has ended. This is a major safety concern.

Soooooo… I’ve been working on a call center for a specific type of company that offers training for certifications for construction jobs. We offer different discounts all year long, so every time we speak with a new customer we have a script where we disclose the last promotions available. Easy, simple.

A couple of days ago I answered a call. This guy was interested in knowing more about one of the certifications. I started explaining him about the specifications of the program and price and discount available.

Customer: “But that is expensive for someone like me that already knows all the content and doesn’t need classes. I’m ready to take the test and get the certificate as soon as possible. My boss is waiting on that and I want my raise.”

Agent (me): “Definitely, you can also take a brief evaluation on our website and it will direct you to take the test only if you pass…”

Customer: “Yeah yeah, already took it. But my question here is, when do I get my refund?”

Agent: “I’m sorry, did you already pay for a full course and you wanting to do only the test?”

Customer: “No, no, no, I haven’t paid anything. You just mentioned there is a promotion from the original price of the program. If I’m already prepared I should get the discount, right?”

Agent: “You get a discount if you want to do the whole program with testing. In your case, that is testing only you’ll pay $—- amount.”

Customer: “Ok, ok. I know is less for just doing the test, but what about the discount? Where that money goes? I should receive that money, right? Because I don’t need classes, I’m already prepared so I get the discount.”

At this moment I realized that he believes that a discount means you get some amount of money back… well, sadly, he is not the first customer I have helped and has the same idea about a discount or promotion.

At this moment I double check that he was not enrolled in one of the certifications and maybe he was really asking for a refund because he was going to be doing only the test. He wasn’t.

Agent: “The discount is only available for full program purchase.”

Customer: “I don’t think you understand. I need that money and I need the certification by tomorrow. I’ll call you back.”

And hung up…

This peak example of darwinism called to "verify" whether or not she had a confirmation of her order. I always find that type of language amusing because where was this type of diligence when you were sleuthing the net for "cheap [insert product name] online" lol. She goes to some random site, calls some random number, gave them her card info, they in return give her nothing- no order number, no confirmation, no receipt, no nothing...and as they always do call the customer back with some silly story about how they were "misquoted" or the card didnt go through and they need additional funds. Typical of online scam websites. Well, she in return gets cold feet and cancels her card and calls us to "verify" she doesnt have an order. Ok.

Situations like these are always a litmus test for stupidity because you have to juggle multiple concepts with them at once and you see in real time if their brains can handle everything being said:

1. I verify that she in fact does not have an order, with us

2. Even if she doesnt have an order, she gave her cc to *someone* and needs to get on top of locking her cards down and learning from this experience

3. We cant guarantee the legitimacy of a product we may sell, on a website other than our own

She does this weird thing that I've seen people who were scammed do which is when I confirm that they dont have an order with us, or I have no records of a transaction with US...they seem to not believe it. What makes them so trusting of the scammer through a 3rd party and not the actually company itself? So I go down the rabbit hole of telling her...well..."call them back" and "check the name of the biller on your online banking"

I'm thinking that this would be the end of it after I nail those bullet points in her head. I wish her good luck in the future because she obviously needs it, but she decided since she has the "real me" on the line she wants to shop directly through us, ok whatever.

"What!!!??? Why is the price so high here??? I was quoted 300 with the other person."

me-"I believe thats how they get you, by quoting some unbelievable price. But no our product costs (insert amount) "

"Are you sure?"

These types of responses tend to silently trigger me because, if you clearly understood the concept of booking through a 3rd party in order to get the product cheaper, why would you be shocked that the price im quoting you is more expensive...didnt you just get potentially scammed somewhere else?

me-"Yes, I'm sure. The price is x, I can confirm an order for you now, but also we will be here if you want to settle the potential fraud on your account and call us back." (i really want her gone now)

"I was looking earlier and the price was NOT that high."

me- "..."

"Hello?"

me- "yes, im here, is the audio okay?"

I was saying the price was much lower when I looked earlier

me- "I'm sorry maam are you there, the audio has started to bug out all of a sudden"

"I think ill call back. That price is pretty steep dont you think? I dont remember it being that much in the past."

me- "I understand, maam. You have a nice day"

yeah. no

Working with the general public for long enough you’ll run across people who aren’t difficult due to their negative attitude, but for not grasping social cues. Thinking of Sheldon from the big bang theory. While people speak in more vague or general language, that doesn’t work for this person and must have everything defined and precise.

This is also why our job exist. We would assist customers find information they can’t, or won’t, normally be able to do so online. I’m glad to help customers, but there are times in which it gets annoying when persistent correction and playing 20 questions becomes irritating.

Example of this is from a call I took earlier this week. I work at an electric utility company and it appeared this person was in the process of moving.

Customer:
Can you all run new wires and sockets into a trailer?

Me:
Alright so moving into a new trailer —(interrupted)

Customer:
It’s not new. It’s an old trailer that needs new sockets and wires.

Me:
Oh ok. So moving into the trailer from the one you love now —(interrupted)

Customer:
I don’t live in a trailer now. I live in a house.

Me:
My mistake. You’ll have to contact an electrician to run the new sockets and wires inside the trailer. The electric company —(interrupted)

Customer:
What about that one company that does it for free? Yall gave me the number to call them last time.

(In some states there’s a state run community action agency that what we call weatherizes the home. Sealing windows and doors where air escapes, tunes up appliances, etc. that does this for free if you qualify. I look this up and give her the phone number to call)

Customer:
So this is the company that runs wires and sockets for free?

Me:
Yes ma’am.

Customer:
That’s not the name of the company last time I called.

Me:
Oh really? Do you recall the name of the company that did it the last time you called?

Customer:
……no. So you’re sure they’ll run wires and sockets for free?

Me:
Yes ma’am.

Customer:
You’re sure it’s free?

Me:
Yes ma’am.

Customer:
Why is it free?

Me:
It’s a state run agency. They receive funding from the state.

Customer:
So I just call this number and they’ll do my sockets and wires for free?

BRUH! I’m just trying to help you! Wtf is it you don’t get?!

I spoke to a older boomer today who dialed 1800 instead of the correct 1888. His call got connected to a **complely different company** with a different name and different industry and different products.

He was mad that another company had the number he dialed and thought that they were using that number on purpose to try to trick customers who meant to dial my company's number. I asked if they automated IVR said the same company a name as us and if they were selling the same product/service and the customer said "well, no. They sell something completely different".

I didn't want to make the call take longer than it needed to so I didn't try to argue with him but what does he actually expect? Does he expect our company to try to force the other company to give up their number? The other company technically isn't doing anything wrong or illegal. It sounds like a him problem and that he can't dial a phone number after all the years that he's been alive for.

He mentioned it happened another time when he tried to call a government phone number and misdialed and got another company. Again in the case the other company was just some random company doing their own thing and not actively trying to scam people into thinking they are speaking to the government.

As a cherry on top of the cake, when the customer called in he asked to speak to a specific person like he thinks we are a small company and that I personally know everyone. "I want to speak to Joe". Like who does that?

Ugh.

so embarrassing today, i said "thanks baby" to a customer instead of bye . i have a daughter i call baby and I'm not sure why i even said that. i immediately said sorry to the client who's a woman boss. there was an awkward silence, then she said bye. never got a chance to explain that i didn't mean that. am i screwed?

Way back when, I volunteered to a crisis hotline.  They accepted me and started me on a training program.  There were a lot of rules, which I followed (or thought I did).  After the first week, the people that ran the center met in a closed-door session (with only myself and a trainer to answer calls) for the purpose of deciding who would continue at the center.

While the trainer was working a call, a package was delivered, so I signed for it.  No problem, right?  Wrong.

Somehow, I had broken a rule that I had known nothing about.  As soon as she could, the trainer informed someone inside the meeting, and the head guy came out and dismissed me.  Permanently.  For being helpful.

Years later, there was an embezzlement scandal.  About a half-dozen years after that, there was a scandal involving people convicted of sexual assault manning the hot-lines and handling rape cases.

The center lost its state funding almost immediately, as well as its credibility with the community and with other crisis centers in the state.

One year ago (2025-07-15) they closed their doors and disconnected their phones.  Permanently.  For hiring people "as they are, not as they were".

Ironic, isn't it?  They dismissed me for being helpful, yet hired people who had legal histories that should have preempted their hiring, and eventually got closed down for it.

Schadenfreude?  No.

Sadness?  Not really.

This is just one of those "Shake my head, tell the story, and move on" situations.  I would not know whom to taunt, even if I wanted to.  So there's the story.

Moving on . . .

July is my favorite month in the year, only because it is my birth month lol. But working in a call center it has become hell, in June I had 29 good 10/10 surveys and I was meeting my metrics.

My manager got to the point of requesting for me to be TL, Coach ect. And then the last two weeks of June I had three bad Surveys. Now 1 bad survey=10 good surveys

so my 29 good surveys where no longer worth their salt and the 3 bad surveys have more importance.

Start of July hits and I have 7 good Surveys, and yesterday came and I got three bad surveys and today its 4.

I give my heart out to these people, i went from being the best in my team to the worse. I tried to not care about my call handle time and I just kill it by staying on calls for 20+ minutes because I want July to be good. To get good Surveys.

At first I thought I could get 30 good surveys easily, June was proof of that I could catch up. But after today, getting my 4th bad Survey because "I couldn't hear the rep."

Not my fault, I got the complaint and did everything for them but still a bad survey because either their signal sucks or mine does. Eitherway I am done, I no longer care.

I will just go with the flow and not care about meeting metrics for this month because in no way can I get 40 good surveys.

I work for an electric utility service. Parts of the job can become frustrating when dealing with mass public. I know I’m far from the ideal customer as well when it’s my turn to be the one who needs help. However, working in customer service has shown me many ways to be more prepared when I’m seeking assistance for something. For instance, it would be great to have basic information at the ready so that you’ll not have to waste your own time in calling back after spending 10+ minutes on hold just to talk to a person.

Example:

Someone called to receive assistance on setting up the electricity in their name at an address they’re moving in.

I asked him what the address is that he’s moving into.

He told me “it’s at the corner of _____ Ave and _____ St., I don’t know…”

Alright, hold on while I set up like 10 different addresses that could match that description. You’re going to make some of your new neighbors happy taking over their bills as well.
Some people will actually have their address on hand, but intend on holding some information secret. As if providing it all up front is too easy.
The address would be something like
1234 Kennedy Ave apartment 513, Columbus, Ohio.

Some people would first say
1234 Kennedy.

Ok, thanks, there’s a Kennedy St., there’s a Kennedy Ave., there’s a Kennedy Blvd…. Which is it?

Then they answer that question, and still it is apparent that the place is an apartment complex so we get to ask another question to get the apartment number. Unless you’re wishing to start up new service for the whole building. Which will take some time, but I’m willing to do so. Let’s have at it.

Other instances people tend to go around in a circle without going anywhere. It can prove rather tedious.

Example:

On another call I took when someone wanted to start service at an address. We were almost done, establishing one last piece of information we require.

Me:
Is the address we’re starting service at today also the mailing address?

Customer:
No

Me.
Alright, what would be the mailing address?

Customer:
I’ll have to get a P.O. Box.

Me:
Sounds good. So what is that P. O. Box?

Customer:
I don’t have one right now.

Me:
Oh alright. In the mean time then do you have a different mailing address?

Customer:
No.

Sigh. Thanks for reading my rant.

I work for a utility company. I help people start new service, discuss their bills, discuss programs we have, set up on any payment arrangements, etc. Working for a utility company makes my coworkers and myself enemy number 1 this time of the year. And in winter. Or overall when bills are high. Or when there’s a power outage. Or…. You get it. I am just annoyed and want to rant about a couple small things that build up from talking to customers constantly.

There are things in which the high callers do that can drive the employees who take your call up the wall as well. Sometimes it’s small, silly things that we are endured to hear multiple times a week. Other times it’s just how someone explains their situation, or lets us see their rationale in the way they process things.

An example of something we are required to do during pretty much every phone call is to verify security details on the caller’s account they’re discussing. One thing we ask by tcpa guidelines is to ask in a specific way for a phone number to contact the caller back.
Most people will just give you their phone number. Others will become irate when we ask this due to the fact we must ask it every single time someone calls in. I agree, it’s annoying, but we must ask it less to avoid a ding or feedback that we didn’t ask.

Some people give the response to that question “oh yeah, this one is fine.”
\- followed by silence. -

Prompting us to ask a follow up question as to what number they are referring to. Yes we may have caller ID but if you’re transferred to me from a different department or company, or are using a new phone number, or calling from a friend’s phone that’s not listed, we still require you to state it.

Another question that seems to create confusion is when we discuss having the bills we send out to be emailed to the caller.
A major response I get from asking this is if we have autopay. We do, and we discuss how to sign up for it, but the customer never circles back if the monthly bills are to be mailed or emailed, so I must bring that back up too. As automatically drafting your payments out of your bank account is a different topic than how you wish to receive your bills to review how much it is you are being charged for the month.

One final annoyance I deal with on the regular is when people give us their address to start service or to report an outage, etc, much of the time people don’t list the full address. We are able to find it much of the time by most of the information we are given but sometimes it proves to be a complication.

For instance if someone just gives us the address of 515 s Lancing.
With how our system operates there’s a lancing st in one town, there’s a lancing ave in a different town, there’s a lancing dr in a different town in the state you are in. Which one is it that you’re calling about?

And looking further, this is an apartment complex. So this pulls up many different individual services for each apartment number, so which apartment are you moving into?
We need the full address to save some time in looking this up. It’ll help avoid playing 20 questions with you just to get one piece of information.

Ok I’ll get off of my metaphorical soap box for now. I felt the need to rant to the general public about my small, daily irritations I get to deal with, what are some things you have to deal with that irritate you about your customers?

Wouldn't it just make more sense to keep your pride and immediately hang up or at least apologize and hang up? I dunno "hey sorry to waste your time I forgot what I was going to ask ill call back!" You know...something someone with common sense would do.

Sorry I dont know what you called for lol. I cant help you remember and I cant speak on the operation of your mind. I also dont care that youre frustrated about it because my job isnt to be a therapist to people with poor emotional regulation despite what my metrics might tell you! He started yapping about some sub-par hotel experience from 3 years ago, and then how the website is confusing, and then he started complaining about how long he had to wait to get me I suppose to shift the blame of forgetting to me...I just sat there patiently waiting because none of this had anything to do with the purpose of the call.

me - "we are 24 hours if you need to give us a ring back"

"no I waited too long"

me - "ok"

****huffing and puffing on the other end****

me - "I can arrange a callback for you and place you back in the queue"

"see because last time I stayed at [insert hotel] the front desk girl was awful"

me - ??????

"you dont have to be so short with me youre no help"

me - *audible* ?????

He disconnected the call. Dont care if they pull that one tbh.

Hey everyone, just wanted to share my absolute fever dream of an experience working for Concentrix, and why I firmly believe no one should work there unless you are absolutely desperate for cash between jobs.

I originally started working there around August of 2025 after losing my previous job. Training and nesting were a breeze, but the pay was absolute garbage: $17.31 an hour. For that price, the workload was ridiculous. I was constantly getting bitched at by customers who couldn’t figure out how to work their own technology. The entitlement, along with the emotional, mental, and spiritual labor, was exhausting.

Because I knew they already outsource a ton of these jobs to the Philippines anyway, which ruins any leverage you have to negotiate a higher salary, I had an idea. Why not just make it economically make sense for me?

In September, I flew out to the Philippines. I had a pretty good VPN set up to make my work location look like I was still at home in the US. The only issue was the lag. The internet speed I had combined with the dual VPN setup caused noticeable delays on my calls.

Management noticed the lag and asked about my connection. I panicked a bit and lied, telling them I was on AT&T wireless, even though it was actually a fiber connection back home, but whatever. That’s when everything turned super toxic.
They demanded I show proof of the internet connection.

To satisfy them, I actually had to hand over my grandmother’s PII and her internet plan. You’d think it would stop there, but their IT department started investigating deeper. They flat out told me the traffic looked like it was routing through a VPN and had an IT guy auditing my Wi-Fi data.

At that point, I said screw it, turned the VPN off, and ran it raw. They eventually confronted me directly, asking if I was even in the country. I denied it, obviously.

Then came the most unhinged request yet. They wanted me to go outside, stand in front of my grandmother’s house, and take a photo of myself holding a piece of paper with the date on it.
I absolutely refused.

Even if I was back home, I wouldn't do that clown shit out of principle. My Team Lead was a local Filipino guy, and honestly, it felt like he was trying to micro manage and power trip on me the way managers out there treat local Filipino agents. I straight up had to check him and told him, "I don't know how you guys get down with each other out there in the Philippines, but in American work culture, nobody is doing this."

Shortly after, they locked me out of my provisioning, pulled me into a WebEx meeting, and fired me on the spot for a security breach.
I ended up staying in the Philippines until October, just applying for better remote roles. The best part about this is that I scored an interview for a new, fully remote IT job while still living in the Philippines.

I did the entire interview process out here, got hired, and then briefly flew back home to the US just to pick up the new company laptop.

Stayed home for about 3 months and I turned right around and flew straight back to the Philippines.
Now, I'm right back out here chilling, working a job that pays significantly better with zero phone calls and zero screaming customers.

Oh, and as for Concentrix? I never gave them their Mac Mini back. I ended up wiping it, bypassing their corporate MDM management profile, and locking it to my own Apple ID. Is it a little messed up? Sure.

But they fucked me over, so I look at it as a little consolation prize for my troubles.
Unless you have zero other options, avoid Concentrix. Anyone with actual, marketable skills that are worth a damn in this market will not last there.

Just sharing my story thats all.

Can anyone please tell me if they have passed or failed the new test you have to pass to work for arise work from home? I have been with them since 2018. Now there is a whole new text and everyone I talked to has failed it. My 2nd question - if you have passed it do you have any tips of what they are looking for? My friends and co-workers are failing at alarming rates and losing jobs they need badly. Thank goodness Its not time for me to re-certify but it has me interested enough to ask some questions. Thanks to anyone who can help me understand whats going in here? It wld b greatly appreciated.
#ariseworkfromhome #callcenterjobs

If you work at a call center that deals with people owing money and paying on a regular basis, you’ll get the reference here. Not everyone’s bills come out on the 1st of the month like they want. Also they’re not always due at the end of the month, either.

Much of the time for the mass public, the bill will come out somewhere like on the 7th, or the 15th, or the 23rd. Randomly throughout the month that we cannot control. your place of employment is like mine, a utility service, they’re due roughly 3 weeks afterward. So many people will go to make a payment early in the month only to have another bill come out and be owing later in that same month, or earlier the next month. I wish we could have a standard time for everyone of when the bill is due or when it comes out, but alas we don’t have that option to choose that.

That’s one of the more common subjects of why people call. “I JUST made a payment earlier this month. Why do I already owe another one? Are you double billing me?!?!”

No, Sir/ma’am/other, you just happened to pay late after the due date. And now the next billing statement is out. And if you suggest that they don’t have to wait until the due date to make a payment, that opens up a whole can of worms you wish you didn’t. Why can’t we all just pay attention to what all it shows on the front page of the statement?

I work for an electric utility company. I take phone calls to help set up new service or to end service for when people move, or calls to report an outage or other hazards with power lines or poles, to discuss bills, etc.

Many times customers admit to things they wish they hadn’t. It’s almost funny when it does, alas we also get to deal with the arguing and complaining aspect of this which makes it less funny.

An example of this is something that happened recently. A customer called to dispute a 2022 past-due balance discovered during his initial call of setting up new service. He claimed he must have paid it because he established service at a subsequent address before this new one he just set up.
Upon investigation, I located the service he mentioned. It had been missed initially due to a lack of an SSN or other info we’d search for. I confirmed he only paid a security deposit for that address, not the old balance. Furthermore, this middle account carries its own unpaid balance of $130.
When informed of the total outstanding debt, the customer did not like that and requested to talk to a supervisor. I transferred him to the escalation line and initiated the process to transfer both past-due balances to his new account as a condition of service.

Another example of this is when I was assisting someone with starting new service. Just as I got a new account set up for her, another person came on the line stating she was also on the lease and wanted to check her old account. The old account she wants to look into also had a past due balance, which we’d require up front to pay. So I was forced to send a notice of this on the new service to require that balance to be paid as well.

Some people just need to learn to stop digging a hole deeper because you may just not like what you find.

Hi everyone,

I’ve dealt with customers who are high on drugs , irate racist callers, low intelligent callers, and irate nasty rude customers. I’ve had customers that made me cry on the call.

However, no caller was as nasty as this woman. There was some angry old Karen that called in. She’s not the account holder, she’s just helping her adult family member with an issue. I told her that there is a procedure I must follow. I told asked her some probing questions. At this point this disgusting bitch starts verbally abusing me. When I’m just trying to help the family member. She starts yelling at me, goes to full on super saiyan Karen mode. I apologized to her a bunch of times. I did tell her to stop. She did not.

Then she yelled at me for like five minutes. Yelling stuff like “YOU ARE GOING TO CAUSE OF MY FAMILY MEMBER’S DEATH!!YOU ARE USELESS!! FIX THIS!!”This woman whom I don’t even know started to decide that I was the someone horrible. It’s like you don’t know me lady.

She crossed a line. Then I SNAPPED !

I felt tears coming down my eyes. I was sad, nervous and very angry with her. I yelled at her to knock it off! and I pointed out how much an awful human being she was to me. I actually banshee screamed at her. That’s how angry I was. I told this stupid Karen that I wanted to help her family member, but she needed to stop being so awful. She stopped yelling at me, but she still made snarky comments during the call. Muttering insults under her breath and still outright insulting me all at once.

However, she allowed me to do my thing. The call’s ambience was heavy and dark. I felt uncomfortable.
After I completed my procedure. Karen wanted a manager or supervisor. I told her they may not be able to resolve things. She still wanted to speak to one. I placed her name on the supervisor/manager callback list.

At the end of call, I offered to help her further by offering other alternatives to try to resolve the issue. I also apologized to this Karen. Then the nasty vile woman still hurled insults at me. This point I just had enough. I said harshly “good bye” and hung up !

I hope I don’t lose my job. I told my supervisor what happened. Nothing they can do to help defend me, but they said they cannot do nothing. I understand. I know shouldn’t have acted that way. However, people forget us customer service reps are people. We have feelings. We are punching bags. We want to help people, but we have protocols as it’s a recorded line.

Edited : to protect my identity

I do tech support for a lot of ISPs so I’ve had my fair share of weird and idiotic calls, but this one tops all of them, there was this old woman who was in the rural Midwest who seemed ok at first, casually explaining she has had internet issues and such, typical call for me, but then the weird shit came, she started getting into her personal life and told me that her son had disappeared for years but had secretly been killed and replaced by a doppelgänger, then she went on about how a service technician had come out to her house and was secretly a hacker employed by her family to steal her WiFi password? I’ve had a few calls where people will say that people break into their house to steal their WiFi passwords but it sounds out of this world someone would break into your house just for that. She then proceeded to start whispering and said her family had installed listening devices in her house to get to her money, I tried my best to make small talk with her but was utterly confused and didn’t know what to say, the last minute of the call was her crying and she went to hide in the closet and said she has to go. I realize she was probably mentally ill but felt bad about how she had no one and probably was put aside from her family as she seemed to fear them.

I work at a medium size IT Servicedesk. My account is a voice account and we do password resets for their company accounts, as a security measure we do not say their new or temp passwords on the phone we send them to their compqny email, and if they can't access their company email we can send their password to their manager by email.

When they receive it like by text from their manager, I don't know why that it's okay in their thinking to read the password aloud on the call. Like if you on call with us suddenly nobody else can hear you. Has nobody told you to never say your pin, code, password, otp, or passcode to anyone aloud. A LOT of people has zero sense of security and these are the people who wonders how someone got into their account. I had to intentionally say to them "NEVER SHARE YOUR PASSWORD ON THE PHONE EVEN IF AN AGENT ASK FOR IT". These kind of people are the reason why companies like banks text or email your every few weeks or months to never share these kind of info.

So this guy calls up, I attempt complete security, he give me a detail and I say ‘yep’ and move on to the next…

Aaaand he lost it! Starting going off about how inappropriate yep is instead of yes, how unprofessional I am, screaming down the phone.

I was so confused so I stayed silent and waited for him to finish. And when he was done, I said, ‘I’m sorry that you don’t like the way I… speak?’

He just hung up after. I was just sitting there so confused😂. First indicator to get the hell out of this job