Perhaps I should just hang up now..

PERHAPS I SHOULD JUST HANG UP NOW....(reposted and edited by popular request)

Part of my job function involves answering a telephone. The other part of my job apparently involves teaching social invalids, basic communication/ office skills.

This blog should be titled,
" HOW TO BE A SUCCESS ON THE PHONE",
or
"GIVE ME ONE REASON WHY I SHOULDN'T HANG UP RIGHT NOW!"
Still working on it. I better start with the rules:

TO CALLERS:
1) When I say "Good Morning, Company "X",.... You are now, "ON THE AIR"....
Now's your big, fat opportunity to tell me to whom you wish to speak, ask your question, or basically just get on with it....

DON'T give me dead air, DON'T be having a conversation with someone else, and DON'T yell into your speaker phone unintelligibly from across the room.
I will hang up on you. Not because I'm mad. But to give you a second chance to get it right.

2) Don't ask me to "Guess Who"...Guess why?
I DON"T CARE.
You were the one that called. Presumably you wanted something. If I were a psychic, I would have called you. That pretty much settles that.

3) If YOU ARE A TELEMARKETER......and you want to sell me something, don't act like we're friends. Because we're not.
I get 1,000 sales calls a day. Give me the information you can, let me politely say no, take me off your list and have a nice day.
If you can't do that...and won't give me a supervisor when I ask for one, be advised, that I too, work on the phone, have a chip on my shoulder, and am gifted with mild stalking tendencies, so I will *69 the phone if I don't already have your company name and probably get you fired, because I wrote down your name when you called, jerkweed.

4) If you are a telemarketer and you want my respect, come up with something cooler than me....like this...
A guy calls up, offers X,Y, Z service. I say "no thank you, please take us off your list"... and he goes, "TSK TSK TSK....now I'm gonna have to put you on our list of BAD BUSINESSES..."
So I ask, "what's that mean?" and he says, "IT MEANS, YOU SUCK."
I was speechless. And concerned. It's possible that I might actually suck.

5) If you WANT TO TALK TO MY BOSS,
DON"T be a WISEASS.
You know he doesn't know you. You know I know he doesn't know you. Don't pretend you lost his cell number because, I won't give it to you. Not because I'm not allowed to, but just because I want to see how hard you will work for it. If you play the game right, I will give it to you. If you don't...I will throw your message away.
DON"T ask me when I expect him, because I don't. He sneaks up on us to make sure we're working.

6) IDENTIFY YOURSELF.
I will answer your jackass question with another jackass question until you tell me who you are and what you want from my life. Don't get offended either, because as you will recall, I know that you are NOBODY, who doesn't know my boss.

7) Be REEEEEALLLLY nice.
Any calls that start off, "YOU PEOPLE....", probably won't get you the response you wanted.
Neither will any calls that start out, "Accounts Payable, Please....."

8) Don't PRESUME that because I'm a woman and I answered the phone pleasantly that:
a) I am pleasant
b) I work for you
c) If I say, " Would you like SO AND SO's voicemail?"....that I would be equally as happy to take a message for SO and SO. I would not. That's why I offered you the voicemail. He's a complete prick. You called him, and say you're his friend, so you are a prick, too.
Leave him whatever message you want all private and comfy on his voicemail. Talk as much as you want about porn, being drunk, crashing whatever party no one wanted you at or whatever you would talk about with someone as nasty as that...but I'm not writing any of your crap down, getting off my equally as important ass, to discuss your waste of a message.
I don't work for him, could care less if he gets your message, and since I'm not speaking to him, giving him your message is out of the question. Sorry. The only reason he didn't pick up his extension is that his phone is buried under 3 feet of garbage and newspapers; like one those people you've read about who had to be rescued from his home, because the paper piled up too high and he couldn't find the door. dick.

9) If for some reason, I am required to put you on hold, and you decide to hang up because your party didn't answer IMMEDIATELY.....
Don't call back and tell me, "Oh, I got disconnected." No you didn't. You hung up. I saw you. Back in line you go.
Don't call me up with that tone,(YOU know the one), and whine, " I was waiting for X...and you LEFT me on hold..."
Hold is where you go, when I set the phone down to tell X he has a call. I don't have magic powers to MAKE him take your call.
And if you had stayed on hold rather than completely unravel, you would have known that after 2 minutes, I did check back to tell you his line was engaged and you had already panicked about your self worth and hung up.
I didn't LEAVE you anywhere. You are responsible for your own issues. Get therapy.

10) If you are EATING, SNIFFLING,COUGHING, or making some other nasty, mucus-y noise in my ear when I pick up the phone, I will do absolutely the same thing to you, just to gross you out, right before I transfer you. Or hang up. Depends on what I hear.