Messed up- feeling awful

Lemoncake01

Created a throwaway account for this. I work as an inbound customer service advisor for a large company. We are more expensive than our competitors. Basically, I had a lady on the phone the other day who I think had dementia (she was very confused about basic things on her account.) she thought that she had an account with us but it was actually with a competitor. I didn't explain that properly to her and, when she asked if we provided her with the relevant service, I put her through to sales to join us. She didn't fully understand the process and her query was to do with a competitior; I should not have offered to put her through to sales and I feel absolutely awful.

Sales will phone her back next week to give her a quote for the product but I hope she doesn't take it: our company is very expensive. I don't know why I put a confused lady through to sales but I feel awful and can't stop thinking about it. I can't leave this job because I only started a few months ago and need the money.

I feel that I've scammed someone and it's really eating me up inside. I took advantage of a vulnerable person and it's not even that I get a bonus or anything for generating a new sale; I don't know why I did it. I don't want to go to work tomorrow as I feel I'm not doing well at the job and I'm not helping customers. I just want to share this with someone.

Big Bag of Chips

Why don't you share it with your boss? Or the sales team? Nothing has happened yet, and you are in a position to stop something happening. Nobody minds anybody making mistake. And nobody minds anybody owning up to that mistake.

This is something that can be fixed by talking to people you work with.

Airyfairy12

Call her back, say you made a mistake and she's not with your company, contact sales and cancel the request or if you cant do that inform the lady to ignore the sales call.

LegacyUser

It sounds like a situation you hadn't come across previously and when you're put on the spot those are some of the hardest to manage. You put her through to sales because she made a sales related query and you followed her cue. We all do things like that in unfamiliar situations, follow protocols, that wasn't you scamming her or taking advantage. And if you noticed her confusion, then it should also have been apparent to the person in sales.

As you're still concerned, it sounds like an easy situation to rectify. You could contact your sales team and let them know that on further reflection you feel the ladies level of confusion means she is probably not in a position to make a sound decision about switching providers. They could perhaps cancel the planned call or recommend a relative contacts them on her behalf to discuss a purchase.

Alternatively, you could call the lady back and redirect her to talk to her own service provider or suggest she asks a relative to phone on her behalf to assist with her query.

LynnGrace

You're overthinking this and being very hard on yourself. Go to your supervisor or manager and explain that you made a mistake. It can be resolved quite easily.