Your call is important to us, Please hold!

Qantas passenger kept on hold 'for 15 hours'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-19114403
An Australian man has said he was kept on hold by airline Qantas for 15 hours, while calling to confirm travel plans.
Andrew Kahn told Australian media he called on Wednesday evening, hearing a message promising someone would speak to him "as soon as possible".
Mr Kahn said he left the call running overnight and eventually hung up just after 11:00 the next morning, not having spoken to anyone.

What's the longest you've ever been "on hold"?,
My record was only the other day with an ISP* and that was nearly two hours before giving up, work phone so I didn't have to pay the bill.


*name with held to protect the guilty - well to avoid amudsling match :pac:

El Guapo!

I was on hold for 10 mins yesterday to Bank of Ireland while trying to lodge a complaint. I gave up after that. There's no way I was wasting any more time listening to the poxy music they play while you're on hold. And I still can't find a complaints section on their website. :mad:

pcardin

45min waiting to speak with BordFart. That was the first and only time I have given somebody that much my time. Usually I wait for about 5min and then hung up.

ejmaztec

Dean09 wrote: »

I was on hold for 10 mins yesterday to Bank of Ireland while trying to lodge a complaint. I gave up after that. There's no way I was wasting any more time listening to the poxy music they play while you're on hold. And I still can't find a complaints section on their website. :mad:

You should ring them and ask them where it is.

pcardin

ejmaztec wrote: »

You should ring them and ask them where it is.

aha, because your call is important to us!

Jester252

Depends on the song

Jester252

Jester252 wrote: »

Depends on the song

Where To

If a real live person doesn't answer the phone I hang up.
F***ed if a recorded voice is gonna tell me what to do.

ArtyC

Dean09 wrote: »

I was on hold for 10 mins yesterday to Bank of Ireland while trying to lodge a complaint. I gave up after that. There's no way I was wasting any more time listening to the poxy music they play while you're on hold. And I still can't find a complaints section on their website. :mad:

I couldn't find a complaints section online either and I was looking yesterday! Desperate music!!

Grayson

It's actually possible for the systems to lose calls. I have occasional work with a few them and calls do get dropped with a regular frequency.

Weirdest I've heard of is a callback system that fecked up. The idea was that during peaktimes it would record your number and offer a call back. So after the queues disappeared and there were reps free, it would call you back automatically and an rep who was waiting or a call would get a little thing saying outbound. Great idea except for once where I say one of those systems call back random people. It was just random phone numbers. they weren't even customers or even in the same country. One guy got woken by it at 5am.

IvySlayer

Aren't phones for businesses a bit outdated with the internet?

Solair

I won't wait more than 10 minutes. If it goes longer than that, they've lost my business permanently. Really couldn't be bothered dealing with companies like that.

I'll e-mail / contact online and if that's not responded to in reasonable time ... really not worth the hassle dealing with an organisation that can't manage to make itself communicable with!

Grayson

IvySlayer wrote: »

Aren't phones for businesses a bit outdated with the internet?

Strangely no. Most companies are expanding phone support and cutting back on email support. The reason is that email support is useless. Think of the quality of posts in the facebook thread. Now imagine those people attempting to write an email outlining a technical issue. A 5 minute call solves more problems that 10 emails.

Solair

Forum-based support is great as it's got the added pressure of public humiliation if they don't resolve the problem

Merkin

25 mins on to Thomas Cook the other day - finally got through to someone on their Indian switchboard with pretty horrendous English

mightdomighty

Dean09 wrote: »

I was on hold for 10 mins yesterday to Bank of Ireland while trying to lodge a complaint. I gave up after that. There's no way I was wasting any more time listening to the poxy music they play while you're on hold. And I still can't find a complaints section on their website. :mad:

Funny that, Its almost like they don't give a ****

Solair

Dean09 wrote: »

I was on hold for 10 mins yesterday to Bank of Ireland while trying to lodge a complaint. I gave up after that. There's no way I was wasting any more time listening to the poxy music they play while you're on hold. And I still can't find a complaints section on their website. :mad:

Next time, try their forum on Boards.ie :

Talk to Bank of Ireland

El Guapo!

Solair wrote: »

Next time, try their forum on Boards.ie :

Talk to Bank of Ireland

Never even thought of that. Gonna stick my complaint up there later on. Cheers!

zega

Handy little tip SOME automated phone systems if you keep hammering "0" out of it it gets you through to a human.Can't remember where i heard this but i use it all the time when ringing UPS,fedex,Dhl

westendgirlie

Eircom - yer man that asks the questions so that he can put you through to the correct department is a d1ckhead. Never understands a word I say.

Why don't they have a "press 1, press 2...." option. So much more user friendly.

Yer man on Revenue is sound though. I like him

Solair

westendgirlie wrote: »

Eircom - yer man that asks the questions so that he can put you through to the correct department is a d1ckhead. Never understands a word I say.

Why don't they have a "press 1, press 2...." option. So much more user friendly.

Yer man on Revenue is sound though. I like him

Except when he says "You have selected - make a voluntary contribution of €10,000 to the state... To continue say anything..."

westendgirlie

Solair wrote: »

Except when he says "You have selected - make a voluntary contribution of €10,000 to the state... To continue say anything..."

Helix

was on hold for 20 minutes with an isp over here before my call was cut off. i was calling to enquire about signing up for their cable internet and i can safely say that im kinda glad nobody picked up in the end, because i'd hate to think what wouldve happened if i got signed up and had a problem down the line