I have an appointment

Yesterday I had a lady walk in at about 2:50pm. This is how the interaction went down.

Her: Hello my name is Angie and I have an appointment.

Me: Ok. Who was your appointment with?

H: I don't know what his name was but I told him I would be in between 1 and 3.

Me: and you don't know his name at all. First name or last name?

H: No. It was a meeting for a conference.

M: ok...

(I call the person who handles conferences. But he doesn't pick up. Then it hits me that this lady might be this stupid if she didn't know his name so I ask)

M: Were you helping with one of our conferences or were you purchasing for your own conference.

H: It's for our conference. (And then she proceeds to tell me way too much information than I need or care to know about her conference.)

M: alright (picking up the phone to call one of our 12 male sales people...no answer. So I call another one...narrowing down my search to 11. Then I call another one narrowing down my search to 10.)

At this point my boss happens to wander down and talks with this lady. We start to look at Company names and contacts that she is giving us. At which point one of the salesmen that I called that was on the phone has called me back.

M: Hi. Were you expecting someone named Angie to be sometime between 1 and 3 today.

Him: yes

M: Ok she's here

Him: I'll be right down.

M:Ok (To her) his name is Jake and he will be right down.

Her: Jake ok thank you so much!


Ummmm.....how do you set up an appointment with someone and not know their name? Seriously....

Phone solicitors

As much as I hate phone solicitation I have to give them a little bit of credit...I mean the live phone solicitors. I probably get close to 50 calls a day that are some form of phone solicitation. The majority of them being recordings. You know the ones that go "Hi this is Julie from some company. Don't worry this isn't a sales call" when it actually is. I generally just hang up on those. Or the ones that are recorded but make it seem interactive and you can't quite tell what is wrong with gentleman you're speaking to until it clicks and you ask if this is a recording about two times and he never acknowleges that you're speaking. (Which those don't work for me because I'm just trying to figure out where to send them anyway so I'm not listening to their shpeel).

Then there are the regular solicitors that when you answer it takes them a second or two for them to greet you. YOu know they're real persistant and annoying but at least they're live and they have a job (unlike a lot of people in the U.S. right now) so I can't really fault them.

Then there's my favorite one floating around right now. You answer the phone and a recorded voice comes on and says "please hold for the next available rep." ...seriously?! That's not a joke. They call me (and this happens more often than live people but a little less than recordings...not by much) and then expect me to wait for them so they can try to sell me stuff. What are they thinking? Do they really think I want someone to interrupt my day (whether I'm at work or at home) to tell me to hold so that some one can annoy me by trying to sell me something I clearly don't need otherwise I'd already own it!

Although it is easier to hang up on those people because you don't feel even a little bit rude. It's rediculous. Granted I believe it doesn't take that long for them to get to you but I've only waited one time to make sure that it wasn't someone that was trying to work with us...you know a buyer...but it was just solicitation.

These annoy me the most because it's just laziness. If you want to be more productive don't have people wait for you....here's a buisness tip for you...customers hate waiting...any idiot who has been on hold or had to wait in line knows this...so why do these companies think they will work...why?!

Sorry for the reant I just think this one is WAAAAAYYYY too rediculous!!

Tragic tragic events for receptionists!

My friend is a receptionist as well and sent me this little story that I thought was quite good and I had to share it. [Note: I have altered names and e-mails so they weren't all over the web]

Begin her story now:

This is the woman I was just talking with.

I said "Send me a detailed email explaining what you're looking for and why you need to speak with James or another expert. The more we understand about your request the better we can help you."

Woman- "Ok, sure I'll write it all out. I'm confused because I didn't find anything when I looked for Teflon on your site"

me- "Did you use the 'find something' feature? I just did and found 752 results under the term 'Teflon"

W- "How do you spell that? T-e-f...?"

M- "T-E-F-L-O-N"

W- "Still not working for me. What's your name and email?"

M- " I'm Maryanne, email is my first name, M-A-R-Y-A-N-N-E @a random e-mail company.com, Maryanne is one word"

W- "Oh, one word, ok got it. Thanks Maryanne. Still not finding anything. How do you spell Teflon again?"

M- "T-E-F-L-O-N"

W- I'll just email you.

This is what I get, 2 seconds after we hang up:

Begin forwarded message:
From: "Amanda"
Date: September 17, 2009 12:19:26 PM EDT
To: "Maryanne"
Subject: Teflon!!

Mary Anne,

Looking for Teflon reports or articles for Mr. Williams.

-Amanda





Lovely. I think I most enjoy the fact that my friend "Maryanne" told the lady it was one word and then made it two words in the e-mail. There are so many tragic things happening in this conversation that it makes me happy not to have to work for anything that has to do with Teflon!

Crazy people can be the funniest!

I told you I had many stories so I figured why not post two today since it's been so long!

This call happened earlier this week. It was one of the strangest phone calls I've ever had both professionally and non-professionally.

Me: Good morning place of buisness.

Her: Hello?

Me: Hello?

Her: Yes?

Me: Hello?

Her: Who is this?

Me: This is name of myself.

Her: Well, what do you want?

Me: I'm sorry?

Her: I think you have the wrong number!

Me: What?

Her: Goodbye.



I was soooo confused! First off all she called me. Second of all I don't know what sort of demension she was in! I didn't know how to handle that call....at all! I don't think they have any sort of training available for those types of calls!

Working on the clock...

It's been a while but I have MANY MANY stories...I may or may not have forgotten which user name I picked (except that I do know and I def. did forget!)

Anyway here's a story for you today....

A couple of weeks ago I get a phone call that goes a little something like this:

Me: Good afternoon my place of buisness

Him: hello I'm with this certain company and I recieved a package today and it doesn't say who it goes to. But it has your company name and logo with your address and this number. I just need to know who I'm supposed to send it to.

Me: Sure no problem. Let me just look you up in the system. You were from this certain comapny is that correct?

Him: Yes.

Me: ok. (LLLLLLLLLLOOOOOONNNNNGGGG PAUSE) I'm sorry I'm trying to look you up but our system is a little slow.

Him: That's ok. I'm on the clock so take as much time as you need!


On the clock indeed!