If you work a desk job in customer service, you are usually very accustomed to the wretched phenomenon known as “the repeat customer”. One one hand, this person could be the result of some horribly unfortunate circumstances - eight leaks in two months? Yeah, that’s shitty. Let me see if I can help you with that. However, on the other, more familiar end of the spectrum, there are customers like Mrs. Kvetch.
Mrs. Kvetch is somewhere between sixty and two thousand years of age. Mrs. Kvetch is bored, and therefore perpetually in need of something to complain about. Mrs. Kvetch is a loony old bat whose marbles have clearly been absconded with, because how dare you suggest she lost them.
When I started working at Joe Schmoe Homebuilders, Mrs. Kvetch had just purchased a new home in one of our actively selling communities. My training was trial by fire, because it was fourth quarter, and because Mrs. Kvetch had my direct line. Mrs. Kvetch called me every single day, from the beginning of December, all the way through February.
My heater is broken.
The heater is making everything too hot.
The windows were installed crooked.
My windows are dirty.
My garage door is too noisy when it opens.
I can’t hear the garage door open any more, and now I can’t hear my son come in the house he keeps scaring me.
It takes 35 seconds for the water to get hot.
The water from the tap doesn’t get cold, just lukewarm.
It went on and on and on.
Something exciting must have happened to Mrs. Kvetch around March, because she stopped calling suddenly. Maybe her nemesis at the Bingo parlor died, and she had to go pay her insincere respects. Maybe they were replacing the pastor at her church, and she was busy taking it upon herself to vet his doctrinal leanings. Maybe she was having too much fun harassing the local pharmacist asking if her 20+ supplement tablets were FDA approved. Whatever the hell it was that diverted Mrs. Kvetch’s attention from calling me daily, I thanked every god I’d ever heard of for the reprieve.
Then, one sunny, happy Friday, my phone rang. Guess who it was?
Warranty, this is Hyde. How can I help you?
IS THIS HYDE?
Oh, merciful heavens…
Hello again, Mrs. Kvetch.
THE GROUT AROUND MY BATHROOM SINK IS CRACKING. FIX IT.
Absolutely, ma’am…
The annoying requests began anew, except now they were even more ridiculous.
My toilet’s clogged. FIX IT.
A light bulb burned out. FIX IT.
I scratched the paint on the inside of my closet. FIX IT.
The gardener mowed my lawn too short. FIX IT.
There are too many bugs outside. FIX IT.
Fortunately she’d slowed her pace to calling once a week, as opposed to every day.
I attempted to stanch the flow of madness by gently letting her know that these things were not warrantable, they were homeowner maintenance issues. For my efforts, Mrs. Kvetch saw fit to reward me with a deafening stream of profanity, complaints, and threats to sue.
However, I did not cave entirely. Instead of putting the foolish requests in writing for the poor field representative who handled her project, I played the sympathetic listener, said I’d open a ticket, and hung up on her. It’s been months now, and she has yet to call with a legitimate request for service. Every once in awhile she’ll call and tell me that her refrigerator is the wrong color - FIX IT! - or that the ceiling got lower overnight - FIX IT! - but otherwise, my method of dealing with her has worked wonders.
Insufferable moldy old corpse.
Did I mention the hilarious irony of the fact that her name is in reality Mrs. Kvetch? I didn’t even have to make that up…
Submitted November 06, 2015 at 01:42AM by mrhydessweetheart http://ift.tt/1Rznzsw talesfromcallcenters
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