Mary: "Dr. Grumpy's office, this is Mary."
Ms. Cell: "I've tried calling your office 5 times today, and the calls keep getting dropped."
Mary: "I'm sorry. What can I help you with?"
Mrs. Cell: "You could get your phones fixed so they don't keep dropping my calls!"
Mary: "Ma'am, usually that's not at our end..."
Mrs. Cell: "Of course it is! I call your office from my cell phone, and the call gets dropped. You think that's a coincidence?"
Mary: "Have you tried calling from a land line?"
Mrs. Cell: "So now you're saying it's MY fault? Is that it?"
Mary: "No, but..."
Mrs. Cell: "Look, I need to..."
(silence)
Keep going Mary , you are doing a great job .
ReplyDeleteOh my! Mary needs combat pay.
ReplyDeleteNo surprise. I'm the official greeter in my office--right on the main drag.
People expect directions, wheelchairs, a public phone, copier and fax, too.
Sometimes, I'm nice, but sometimes, I just have to shut my door...
I have a lot of respects for good receptionists. It's not easy dealing with people sometimes. They really are tolerant, patient people. I don't think I could greet or answer phones all day. I would go nuts.
ReplyDeleteMary needs another raise!!
ReplyDeleteMary is wonderful. I get a lot of these calls, too. Sometimes you can barely make out the new form of vocoder English: a digitized approximation of real English.
ReplyDeleteThese are symptoms of the collapse of the US Public Switched Telephone Network. (You think I'm kidding.) Opinion: reliability is expensive and no one wants to pay for it.
Isn't it true that the person who answers the phone is responsible for EVERYTHING and EVERYTHING that goes wrong is her fault?
ReplyDeleteI am reminded of the time I was running late for a witness interview. I called my colleague who was conducting the interview with me and left a message on her voice mail. She later had me listen to the message: For the first 90 sec, I ranted about the traffic. Then I said, "If you start without me, the most critical information we need to get from him is ....." All you could hear was loud static that sounded like cellophane bags of potato chips caught in a wind tunnel. TCG
Oh boy, that caller should exactly like my mom when she calls me. It's never her phone at fault when my phone doesn't ring.
ReplyDelete