“Well I don’t give a -“

I’ve never worked in a call centre, but my sister did. When I was in grade 9 we had take your kid to work day. Thing is, I worked for my mom after school in her daycare and didn’t feel like doing that for a whole day, so I convinced my sister to convince her boss to let me come in with her.

I’m sure most of you know about “y-connectors”, but just in case, they’re commonly used for training, and allow an extra person to hear what’s going on, but the customer can’t hear them. This is what I spent most of the day on. Let’s also not forget that while she had previously been in departments contacted by American companies, at this time she was working with a Canadian company. This caller happened to be in our city, which popped up on the screen when the call came in.

About 2pm, we got a call. S will be my sister and C will be caller:

S: good afternoon, thank you for calling company, S speaking, how may I help you? C: hello, yes. I want you to turn my fing cable back on. S: okay, ma’am. If you could just give me your account number and password I’d be happy to pull it up and see what I can do. C: *gives info S: taps my shoulder and points out the address to me; it’s a super scuzzy part of the city ah. I’m sorry, ma’am, but our records show that your service was cut off for non-payment, so at this time I am unable to reinstate your cable. I would be happy to forward you to our financial department so you can update your payment information though, and then they can get you back up and running! C: um, no, welfare fing told me they would cover it. S (rolling her eyes at me): ma’am, I see here that welfare covers your phone bill because that’s considered a necessity, but your cable is not. So no, they won’t cover that. C: THEY FING TOLD ME – S (getting nervous about the language with her 14 year-old sister listening in): excuse me, ma’am, but this is a business line, so I’m going to have to ask you to refrain from using that lang – C: WELL I DON’T GIVE A F! *click

My sister and I just sat there staring at each other for a solid 30 seconds, and then burst out laughing. She then updated the notes about the call (excessive cursing, thinks welfare is paying for her cable, etc) on the woman’s account. Just out of curiosity, we decided to look through the other notes. Much the same.

I wish I knew what ended up happening with that woman. I don’t think my sister ever got her again.