“If you have a daughter, I hope she gets raped tonight!”
Word for word, no edits, this scathing comment was aimed at an 18 year old woman, formerly a human being, but now designated as one of the most vile, putrid byproducts of humanity, the customer support representative. I should know. The hapless teenager that gem was aimed at was me, thankfully childless to that point. My transgression had occurred when I’d issued a refund to this man’s credit card and told him that it could take up to two weeks. Mind, this was out of my hands, it’s up to the credit card as to when they apply credits.
Really, I wish I could have gone back to the day in that person’s life when his parents were teaching him manners and respect for your fellow man. “Now, Junior. Remember to be polite to everyone…except customer support representatives. Whine, badger, insult, and generally fuck with these bastards until they forget they ever had a soul or a single shred of self-worth. And if you don’t run over their dog, at least threaten to.”
If it’s one thing that I’ve realized in my 7 years since that phone call, it’s that people don’t know how to be customers. This is assuming, of course, that a customer is a person wanting to obtain something efficiently, whether it be a product or a service. Now, I freely and openly admit that yes, a great deal of customer support representatives don’t know their business from their rear ends, but they have manuals, they have training, they have a swift finger pointing to the door if they really can’t figure it all out. The same cannot be said of customers. Come one, come all ye ignorant beasts, and no matter how much you plague us, I guarantee you’ll never be unwelcome to fill the position of The Customer.
Let me assure you that you that being the best customer you can be is not just beneficial for the stores, people and business that “hire” you, but it is most beneficial for YOU. You’ve seen or heard people on the phone with customer support. They are frustrated. They are confused. They have a handful of pills : 3 ibuprofen, 2 Tums, 1 shiny-happy pill, all waiting to be washed down with a shot of whiskey. Does that seem healthy to you?
If you have a choice in the matter, why wouldn’t you want to be the most efficient customer you can? You can save time, money and frustration by just unlearning a few bad habits and picking up a few good ones. What could be bad about that?
