Why do people think that holding us hostage on the phone will get their issue resolved faster?

I can understand the frustration of dealing with some call centers who will transfer you to hell and back, but…..jeez, people.

I just got off the phone with someone who is having some issues with their website. They aren’t super critical issues, but it’s making the payment page appear a bit wonky. I have told her that I’ll need to reach out to our web developer to fix. As in, I DM’ed our web dev while on the call.

The woman did not want to let me off the phone. Kept asking me if she’d “have to wait 30 minutes in the queue again” if I disconnected. Wanted to know if the web dev was looking into it “right now”. Kept reiterating that it was a critical issue and she didn’t want to have to go to someone else. Kept demanding that I remain on the line until the issue was resolved. It took me a good ten minutes to convince her that I would call/email her back as soon as the web dev had made the changes and I was able to test. It’s part of my job. I’m not going to just leave you hanging.

At my job, we’re encouraged to resolve issues over the phone if we can, but if we’ve done all we can over the phone, we need to be disconnecting. Especially if it involves waiting for another department to do their part. I’ve had people get rather aggressive about this, and some people have sat on the phone with customers for over an hour. I’ve had people tell me that they are not letting me off the phone until the issue is resolved when I’ve told them we can’t fix it and that they’ll need to go to X or Y resource instead.

I hate that someone thinks that they can control me in that way. Why? Do these people have literally nothing else to do with their day than sit on the phone and breathe in my ear until I’ve fixed their problem? When I call any kind of support line, the interaction is kept as efficient and quick as possible. It seems like the customers I deal with just pull out a couch and Doritos with the intention of literally sitting there all day until their problem is fixed. Even if I’ve told them I literally cannot help you until you let me off the phone so I can call Resource X or Y. Or, I can’t help you at all because this isn’t my department and I don’t have the resources, authority, or ability to help you, so go HERE to someone who CAN.

Like, if it’s an urgent issue I can understand being frazzled/frustrated, but your keeping me prisoner on the phone line is literally preventing me from helping you. If you want to rant and rave for two hours and demand I stay on the line for all of it, how does that help you? Does your ranting make me move quicker? And if it did, have you realized that I’m still on the fucking phone unable to help you because you’d rather me listen to you scream than actually fix your issue?