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2004-04-12 - 8:14 p.m. I don't mean to interrupt, but Ya know... there's just no way to point out to someone that they are constantly rudely interrupting you without making them think that you are the rude one. I had to call my cable company again today, because I got a bill that was, again, wrong. I called last month... and the month before that... because the bill was wrong. Every time I call, I can barely get a few words out before I'm interrupted. I never get an entire thought finished. I will say, I know these people are not trying to be rude, which unfortunately these days, is something unusual in a customer service rep. They're actually trying to be helpful. They hear the first few words, think they know exactly what I'm going to say next, think they know exactly how to solve my problem, so they proceed, not waiting for me to finish my sentence. The last two times I called, they actually were right about what I was going to say, and how to solve the problem (if what they said they were going to do had actually then occurred), so I let them get by with it. But I clenched my teeth the whole time. Three conversational things I hate to my inner being are being laughed at and/or told I'm wrong when I KNOW I'm right, being ignored, and being interrupted. They're all the same, actually. It's having another person completely discount what I'm saying without even listening to what it was that I said. But anyway. When I got the third wrong bill in a row, I figured at least I'd try and prepare something to say to let them know we obviously aren't communicating, and if they'd actually listen to my problem instead of interrupting me after the first six identifiable words, that might help. I gave it quite a bit of thought and there's no good way to say it. I tried interrupting right back last time. Didn't work. I thought maybe I'd say, "You haven't let me tell you the whole problem. May I continue?" or "I'm afraid I didn't get to finish what I was saying. Should I start again?" Those are just going to sound bitchy no matter how pleasant a tone I use. So I called. Actually got the same woman as last month. Which means she is even MORE convinced that she knows exactly what the problem is, and she interrupted me three times in the first two minutes. So my courteous solution was to go with none of the attempted nice statements I had thought up, and to say instead, "What you're telling me is not helping, and if you'd let me actually finish a sentence, you might understand what my problem is." Oops. Not at nice as I meant to be, but also not nearly as sarcastic as I could have managed at that particular moment. You know what she did? She shut up. She let me say what I had to say. Then when I finally got to the end and asked my question, she said, "Okay, you've asked me to explain something, so now I'm going to, okay?" And she said it with really really very little attitude at all. And I think we may have actually fixed the problem. At least, we did something different than we had done the past two months. When the bill comes next month, we'll see. my mood - |
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