h a l f b a k e r yBreakfast of runners-up.
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No-YOU-wait-for-me
Puts call-centre employee on hold waiting for caller to get back to phone | |
When you call some organisation you are always put on
hold.
Meanwhile you have to wait. Even with the speakerphone
on
with Vivaldi interrupted every x seconds with 'sorry, a little
longer still' is annoying.
A little box with a prerecorded message in the 8 major
languages (select only
1 at a time) that will ask the called
party to knock three times shortly on the receiver which
will
make the telephone of the caller ring. "The person who
called
you is away from the telephone. Please knock on your
microphone three short times, like this: knock-knock-knock
or
whistle and the caller will come to the phone immediately.
Sorry for the inconvinience." A reaction on some key will
not
work for some operators because the can only *receive*
calls
and not dial anything. Therefore we have to rely on voice.
It will be a little box with a RJ11 plug (that little plug that is
compatible with most phone connectors worldwide) on
both ends and a
switch with [wait] and [release]. Once you reached
the
end of the path in a call-centre labyrinth and you are
waiting
in the right queue, you flip the box on wait and go do other
things. Once you get through the phone rings and you can
talk.
The technology in the little box can be less than $5. A chip
with the 8 prerecorded messages, a chip listening for the
three knocks or the whistle (if one method doesn't work,
the
other will) and generating pulses to make the telephone
ring,
a switch and that's about it.
This solution on our end of the line is better than waiting
for
things to change on the other end because it is not in their
interest. The suggestion by McFrank on August 10 in
response
to the waiting party line idea by jutta is much better but
relies on the willingness of the other party. You will always
have 'user-unfriendly' organisations like government agencies
etc. that will never implement a call-back routine.
This will always work, also when you are calling a friend who
says 'hang on, there is someone at the door', while the
friend
called you in the first place. You just put him 'on hold' and
make him listen to the instructions.
Ideally, this gadget should also work with call waiting. While
you have a customer care service on hold on one line, you
are answering a call by a friend on another until you get a
ring from the customer care service that you have made it
through the queue.
call-back feature
http://www.halfbake...ting_20party_20line the idea by McFrank in reaction to 'waiting party line' [rrr, Oct 16 2001, last modified Oct 04 2004]
A bakeable list of counter-ideas.
http://web.tampabay...rchsr/happytech.htm If people would follow these rules, there would be a -lot- less hold time. [StarChaser, Oct 16 2001, last modified Oct 21 2004]
[link]
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To collect your croissant, tap your middle mouse button three times and whistle. |
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Perhaps rather than having multiple languages, it would be more convenient to have a variety of pre-recorded messages, depending on how nasty you intend to be to the person on the other end of the phone. |
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Don't blame us. When everyone is on a call, nobody can answer yours. We do the best we can. |
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StarChaser the Tech Support Tyger |
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[cp] While you are on hold you haven't spoken to anyone
yet. Difficult to determine how nasty you want to get.
And besides, being nasty to them is usually not
productive.
[waugsqueke] I am not sure they will hang up, I think they
will like it. They only have to whistle and within seconds
the caller responds. A caller who is *not* frustrated and
irritated to the bone because he was on hold for 30
minutes. A fresh one, a normal human being. You'd only
had to explain to him who he was calling with. After 30
minutes on hold many problems are certainly not that
important anymore. But for the ones that are important,
this gadget is a must-have.
[PeterSealy] The idea is to fit this mechanism in a little
box that can be used worldwide and costs less than $10.
It's not on the market, I would like to know why not. |
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Wow. I can be quite wordy. |
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The goal of many call-back systems isn't to better connect client and agent, but to get the client to give up. |
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