Yesterday I was trying to find a particular furniture store without success. I called directory assistance in order to get the exact address. Directory assistance has become yet another endlessly annoying service where you have to use voice recognition software.
Irritating computer voice: Do you want directory assistance? Please say "Directory Assistance" [and so on and so forth]
It takes me about 5 tries to ever be understood by the software. Invariably I end up screaming at the stupid system. I did realize that probably some real-life operator is there in the background, but isn't it obvious that the customer is screaming at the system? Apparently not. When I had to say "Ontario" for the umpteenth time to the voice recognition system, I followed "Ontario" with liberal use of the f-word, and yes, the c-word.
Then a real live operator came on. She was close to tears. Instead of saying what a functional employee would say and confirm the business, she said, "I'm not even going there." Excuse me? Going where? I hadn't at that point spoken to a live person - only the voice recognition software. Yet sensi-girl was traumatized by listening to someone swear? Then she adds in the saddest little voice imaginable, "We can hear everything you say".
Really? She could hear everything I say yet somehow or other it took numerous attempts to understand the word Ontario? I had always thought that customers initially did have to go through voice recognition software. If someone is actually there responding, then I pity our society because this one was incompetent. I almost burst out laughing. And I must admit, suddenly I felt good about what I'd yelled at the voice-recognition software.
Then she passed me onto a male supervisor. Again, this is all without me having said a word directly to her. What an overly sensitive loser. The guy was great. He gave me the info with no problem.
In my last job when I covered the phone lines, the one time I passed a client onto a male colleague was because the guy sounded like he was masturbating to me trying to give him safer sex tips. Such are the risks of working on a sexual health line. And even then, I passed him on because the call was going nowhere, not because I was traumatized.
Anyhow, I loathe women like the loser girl I had to endure. Grow a backbone. She should have laughed at me and said, "You know we can hear everything you say..." Then, and only then, if I started swearing directly *at her* she could have terminated the call or passed me on to a supervisor. That I would understand. I wonder how the little twit handles true trauma in life?