What Happens If: You tell a sob story.
What the Experts Say: Customer-service agents aren’t a particularly sympathetic lot. “You’re just one of a hundred customers they’re going to talk to that day,” Katie Sloan says. “They have their own troubles, and they’re simply trying to get through the workday.” And the last thing a rep wants to hear is a long story. “If a caller doesn’t get to the point quickly, the call is going to take more time and energy for the representative,” says Williams. So going on and on about your situation may only make him cranky and uncooperative. “Or it might make him get rid of your call by transferring you to another department, even if he knows that it doesn’t handle that kind of call,” she says.
Still, if you happen to get an agent who sounds at all sympathetic, a brief explanation of your situation might get her to go the extra mile for you. “There have been times when I’ve had good luck with the ‘Oh, man, my boss is going to kill me’ line,” Harris says. “It wasn’t even true, but it was something quick that the rep could relate to.”
Bottom Line: If you think your tale of woe is good enough to win you points, go ahead and try telling it. But keep it short, pay attention to how the rep is responding, and cut it off if she sounds as if she doesn’t want to hear it. “And whatever you do, don’t whine,” Morrill says. “That drives us crazy.”
What Happens If: You ask if you can speak to a supervisor.
What the Experts Say: Supervisors are more able to bend the rules than reps, but getting to one takes some finesse. You can’t just leapfrog over the agent who answers your call. “Some people start demanding a supervisor right away, but I will not transfer anybody until she tells me what she’s calling about,” says Chris Alexinas, a customer-service agent for a phone company. That’s because there are far fewer supervisors than there are reps, and the supervisor is going to be upset if she gets handed a call that the rep could have dealt with. “That’s not going to help my cause or yours,” Alexinas says.
Also, it’s probably not worth asking for a supervisor if things have already gone sour with the agent you’re speaking with. “If a rep thinks you’re going to complain about her to the supervisor, she may just disconnect you,” Williams says. “Or she might get a friend to come on the line and pretend to be a supervisor.” That person is not authorized to do anything different, of course, so she’s just going to repeat what her coworker said.
“I always ask for the rep’s name at the start of the call, because if I ask after the situation gets volatile, she’s going to give me a made-up name,” Williams says. “Then, if things get difficult, I just end the call and dial in again. I tell the new rep that I want to speak to a supervisor about the wonderful service I received from the customer-service department. That’s a sure way to get patched right through, and then I can present my case to someone who can help me.”
Bottom Line: Start with the rep who answers the phone. Keep things amiable, and if the agent says, “I can’t do that for you,” ask to speak with a supervisor. Some call centers have multiple tiers of reps before you get to anyone with real authority, so kindly ask to climb the ladder until you reach someone who is willing and able to give you what you want.
