Shop Talk

When I started with Cingular, AT&T Wireless was long gone, but the backlash was still being felt. I would get call after call from former AT&T Wireless customers stating that since Cingular took over everything sucks. The service: sucks. The phones: suck. Customer service: sucks. The plans: suck. You get the idea. A few months back, my center went exclusively prepaid. I thought that I would not have to worry about former AT&T Wireless customers anymore. I was wrong. I have had several customers who were AT&T Wireless prepaid who had to migrate to Cingular GoPhone due to the TDMA shutdown. They all complain about the plans. The complain about how AT&T used to go off minutes, but Cingular goes off monetary amounts and how they were "forced" to...
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I hate it when people mumble.

Example:

ME - May I have your mobile number area code first?

CUST - 951-??2-??blue9.

ME - I'm sorry. May I have that again?

CUST - I said ???-65r-9??9

ME - Excuse me?

CUST - I SAID 951-555-5555! Are you deaf?

Speak clearly. I am not deaf, but if you do not enunciate, I will keep asking until I can get the right info. Unless you want me to put your prepaid PIN on the wrong account you better speak up.

I hate it when you call from your handset with a problem.

CUST - I need help connecting my bluetooth to my phone.

ME - I'd be happy to help you. You need to go into the menu and select settings.

CUST - (BEEP)(BEEP)(BEEP)

ME - Sir/Ma'am, are you on your phone?

CUST - Yes.

...
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So I just had a very long and very frustrating conversation with a customer (and her husband.)

The problem was a simple one... she spoke no English.

That's not normally a problem, if they ask for a Spanish rep I grind my teeth (because there is an option in the IVR for Spanish, just listen and you'll get a rep who knows what you're saying the first time... you have to push 1 to get an English rep in the first place.) and transfer them to the Spanish department... five seconds, tops...

But his English wasn't bad (he just wasn't listening... I know this because he kept asking a question and then I'd hear him talking to somebody else then come back and say something about not getting the answer.) but when I said "I'm going to need to s...
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Ok i just bought a v3c from a friend, and I am not able to receive transfers of ring tones, pics and videos through bluetooth, but i can send them. Anyone know how to fix this?

People never cease to amaze me.

I had a customer come in earlier inquiring about setting up new service. She is currently with another carrier and is tired of their service. "I really want to switch to you" she tells me. Then she hits me with this:

"It's going to cost me $200 to cancel my service. What can you give me to offset that cost?" 😳 😳

Umm, I'm not paying anyone to switch from another carrier. She wanted a bigger deal on phones, and assumed that the 30 day trial meant we would give her a free month of service.

Now, seriously, why would you think I'd be willing to lose money on products just because you don't want to fulfill your current contract?

Our bonus structure has changed alot lately, and I thought I would see how everyone else's worked.
Ours is that we have to get a minimum of 200 phones(new activations or upgrades).
The next part of it is that we have to have a certain percentage of our calls result in a sale for certain amounts of money per phone.
So for 41% we get a dollar per phone sold
For 43% we get two dollars per phone sold
For 46% we get three dollars per phone
And for 50% we get four dollars.

What are your structures?

Okay, I don't open until 10, but I'm here at 9:30 straightening up and phonescooping until it's time to open. I got 6 phone calls before 10, three of them were asking me to tell their husbands to call home before he left my store.
Lord love small town mentality. Hubbies have cell phones, or else they need to get one, NOW!
The other three are people wanting me to run credit over the phone. Something that is against policy.
It's a small town for heaven's sake, even if you live out in the boonies, it's not like it will take you 10-15 minutes to get here!

Is it just me or is the exchange/refund policy for prepaid PINs kind of stupid. On the back of most prepaid PIN cards, it says that the PIN is non-refundable or exchangable if the PIN has been scratched off. But in order to find out if the PIN works, you have to scratch it off. 🤨

WTF?

God, I love my job.

In the last few days, I have overheard two calls where customers wanted magical solutions. Here is a desciption of both.

C1 - Customer #1
C2 - Customer #2
R - Rep


C1 - I need to return my phone.

R - It is within the 30 days exchange period. You can either take it to a store or we can ship out return labels. Which would you prefer?

C1 - I don't have anywhere you could send them and I don't want to go to the store.

R - Do you have a PO box or a home address?

C1 - No.

R - I can tell you the location of the nearest store.

C1 - I don't want to go to the store.

-END CALL #1-

C2 - I want to change my plan.

R - Okay. You have the $0.25 a minute plan. The other plan is $0.10 a minute with free mobile-to-mobile and...
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so in my store if a customer comes in and ask for you and your not there i would call you. if you dont answer or cant/wont come in then the sales fair game and ill let te customer know that if they want to give you sales you have to be here. (most customers dont care who gets paid) also being behind a counter, in the back , or smoking in front means your not on the sales floor and i dont share ups with people who arent on the floor. ive been told tha these rules are unfair but why would i share sales with someone behind a counter posting on phonescoop all day? what do you do to divide up sales? what floor rule do you work by? is there a perfect system?

so this guy is here and he wants to upgrade his wife's phone. he doesnt want to pay anything and he only wants a one year contract (hes been a customer for over 6 years). i tell him that the cost of the phone will be $50 additionally with a one year contract. he complains about that for a while and says no i want a free phone. i tell him that the phone is free if he signs up for two more years. no no no...has to be one year. finally he agrees to pay the $50....
as im running the credit check, it comes back with a code to call activations. apparently, this guy has a balance of over $100 and i cant upgrade until its paid. he says, oh ill pay it, just tell them to chill. im like ok well i cant procede without you paying it. and he say...
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Have you guys seen that Retro bluetooth handset? You know the one that looks like a regular phone? Has anyone tried it or have you seen anyone use it?

Besides their basic inability to set up cell phone account properly:

I CANT FREAKING PAY MY CREDIT CARD BILL WITHOUT GOING INTO THE DAMNED STORE!!!
I try to access it online, it says the card is not activated, though we've used it for the last year.
(His words to me: "Well unless its activated you cant access it online, since theres no way to know who is inputing the information" hey chuckles.. what the hell does my wife activating it have to do with ME entering the information online!?)
I call them to pay it, theres a 10 dollar charge to pay it on the phone. They wont "activate" the card for me unless my wife calls in (which is fine, I understand that). He wont waive the 10 dollar fee, thereby FORCING me to go to a walmart and make t...
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Trying 2 send Alltel "smiley smurf" 2 T-Moe Razr.Wont do thru SSM/IMS. Any help. I've got Nok 6535i

I don't mind having other departments listen in on my calls, it happens a lot, what I do mind is when they don't tell me they're there!

I just placed an order for a customer, billed to his account, with the care agent hanging muted on the line the whole freaking time. I wouldn't have know except I didn't hang up right after saying "Have a nice day." and while I dispositioned the call in my tracker (expecting him to disconnect anyways) when I hear "Alright, Matt..."

It's just had etiquette to not let the other rep know your lurking.

😢
Stupid skank wearing a white shirt and a blue bra: My phone aint chargin'

Me: I'm sorry we're not a service center, you'll have to take it to the retail store across the street.

SSWWSBB: *chomps gum and stares at me like I am wrong* Whatever.

ACK!

I need a day off 😢

What are the people around you wearing?

Is anyone else getting the free tickets to the Nextel Allstar Challenge in Charlotte? If so have you been able to fill out your form? 😉

It's not Samsung...

It's Samkit.

Just so you know.

i just had a guy that the sale was only happening if i could move his numbers(we have all had them) so i tell him no problem as i am showing him the phones and plans hes asks like 3 more times i keep saying no problem. i go to move them to his sim and the phone says 7 numbers moved so i go into his phone book and its only 7 numbers long.

👀 😳

I wasn't sure how to answer his pouting.

he is old, doesn't know what the arrows mean on the navigation pad, or that they change functions, never mind actually telling him that I could ease his VM login process. He didn't want me to, "it's my wife's phone."

👿

WHY waste 40 min of my time asking me rhetorical/nonsensical questions?

I showed him that holding the 1 key would access what his fumbling had been attempting to as well. took him 10 min to figure out that he didn't have to press anything aside from that to get it to call the VM.

I'm all for safety, but honestly, after a certain age/technological ineptitude, we should REQUIRE a certain dummy-proof phone. if for nothing more than our sanit...
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