A series of unfortunate events

I fell asleep on the train today. On the way back from Kallang. I knocked into the guy's shoulder a bit and it jolted me awake. Thankfully, I didn't mistake his shoulder for a pillow and drooled on it or anything. Was very paiseh for abt 3mins or so, after which i amazingly dozed off again.

Neways this week has been marked by a series of unfortunate events.

Monday: After meeting the product manager in charged of the project, I was led into an office with phones ringing incessantly. Instead of doing outbound calls, I was to be picking up calls instead for a hotline. The line was so HOT, i truly understood the meaning of 'ringing off the hook'.

There was me, me and me. I was instructed to pick up the phones and take down the numbers while he went away to settle some stuff. 10min later, he was back. I had no idea of what I was doing, what service the hotline provided and had been told by an irate customer that I ought to be fired for not knowing anything.

The perm staff were asked to tend to the phone lines too. I was given a 10min 'brief' briefing abt the hotline's service and proceeded to answer calls the whole day.

What Gonzales would say: Insufficient employee training. Yield management.


Tuesday: By day 2, there were 5 people manning the phones. Manpower's up, but due to poor coordination between the company and the 3rd party company engaged, lots of cheques remained uncollected. It was the epitome of customer dissatisfaction. people sitting at home waiting for a courier to come when no one turned up. These people in turn called back and screeched to their heart's content. very zhe2 shou4.

What Gonzales' would say: Emotional labour, frontline, performing way below expectation.

Wednesday: Some of those folks who complained on day 2 had 2x failed collection!! The courier again didn't turned up even after rescheduling! Oh my..

And Miss Hufferphish here was 'handpicked' by the GM for the dept to do the most "honorable" task. To call back customers whose data had been partially LOST from Day 1. Absolutely queer... Somehow, as there were many people jotting down notes and passing around info, the consolidated excel sheet had blanks here and there. And the sup handed me the file with the instruction to 'fill in the blanks'.

That was tramutising...
A typical call went like this:
Hello Sir, I am calling from the xx promotion hotline. Can I just double -check with you some of your particulars?

What do you need?

IC number please?

XXXXXXX

Thank you. Can I have your address too?

The courier picked up my cheque already. How can you not know my address?

I'm sorry sir. I've been handed this file and need to make sure the data is complete.

No. You ask your own company. ...blah blah...

And the above was a moderate case.

A bad case is:

Hello Sir, I am calling from the xx promotion hotline. Can I just double -check with you some of your particulars?

Oh the XXX hotline. You know yesterday I waited and waited and NO ONE came to pick up my cheque. You promised me. And now your company don't even know my details?? I called and your lines were jammed. Left voicemail and sent email and now you are asking ME? Do you know when is my collection date?

(Missing data) Ehm, I'm sorry sir, can I reschedule for you?

I'm asking you! What time were you supposed to come? You tell me!

(Missing data) EHm, I;m really sorry sir, but this file has been passed to me and I do not have these information.

Your company is so inefficient! How can you don't know? I don't care, I'm not going to repeat myself again. I am going to file a complaint! This is ridiculous./ You should be fired/ You are stupid/ You are XXX. Use your imagination, the results are varied.

Repeat variations of the above conversations about 50 times and that's what I did on Wed. Each call was made with dread.

What Gonzales would say: How IT can help? Communication?

Thur: Today! They employed 5 more boys! Overstaffed!
Somehow, God or Satan or Fate. WHoever's up there, down there, around ? Loves to screw me. 5 new computers had been set up in the cubicles for the new staff. And somehow my computer was moved and I had to shift with it.

They use one number for the hotline and the calls are routed to the next available phone. Therefore phone 1 will ring first. If phone one is engaged, the call automatically goes to phone2. If phone 1,2 are both engaged, it goes to phone 3.

With the change in feng shui, my phone seldom rang today. My phone must be number 9 or 10 in line. Cos there was one other guy whose phone didn't ring much.

ANd the GM had stated in the morning that each person should have served 30 customers, minus those who call in for the wrong reasons and ought to be referred elsewhere. So everyone was scrambling to pick up calls n boost their numbers.

30 alright.Problem is there is oversupply of labour and undersupply of customers. Thursday is considered 'off-peak'.
At the end of the day, the max number by the ger at phone 1 is 20. The minimum by phone no 10 probabely is 3.
I had 5, yes 5.

And i was thrown caustic remarks by the GM.

He came once at 2pm: You only have 2? HOw come so few?
"The calls usually don't reach this phone.. The others are ringing you can hear..." *feeling quite useless*

At 430pm, he was back.
"Your list is still so few? The others are still alright. Yours is pathetic.

Yup, he said PATHETIC.

Excuse me? But i'm not in control of the number of callers?? I can't help it if all the calls get picked up b4 phone no 9 and you've doubled your staff on a day when you don't need it!

Economics? I only supply! I don't generate demand! If a prostitute has no customers, she can do a striptease and generate demand. I can't!

I suppose he just wants to be mean.
Sad to say, I seem to be a magnet for meanies. Mean behavior is constantly directed at Moi.

Bad karma? My face? My voice? Whatever, when people don't like me, they can pick on anything.

WHat GOnzales would say: XXXXXXXX

Someone is bound to be retrenched at the rate things are going. You can't be paying folks to sit around staring at the phone and waiting for it to ring.

The Irony...