Wednesday, September 19, 2007

In the name of "Saving Time"

Allow me to rant for a minute.

So, I am going to Ivy Tech full time, and working a full time job, and my "spare time" is very limited. I need a specific software program that the school offers, and has made impossible to find, so I reluctantly searched for a "contact" number for a living, breathing person at the school who can help me find it.

I have spent over an hour now trying to get through to a live person! Each dead-end I encounter on the phone forces me to call back and go through the entire Automated Voice operator system again.

I used to think that the most rude thing an establishment could do (on a public relations level) is to allow their employees to say, "have a good one!" instead of, "have a nice day". Not any more; the rudest thing any customer-conscience company could do is put an automated operator system in. Though they claim that it saves time and money, the savings is very one-sided. If you happen to be the unfortunate person trying to contact the school or business, it is an incredible waste of time and money. They have saved the time of one individual in order to steel the time of every single person who has to call in.

The fact that these operator systems are so widely used is merely a snapshot of what is wrong with our culture. The Automated Voice Operator System (AVOS from here out) is proof that the customer is no longer "right". In fact, it is proof that the establishment has absolutely no regard or respect for the customer, or his/her time.

I could rant about this all day, but they have already stolen 73 minutes from me, and I need to catch up on my work.
...good day.


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