Telstra's infuriating answering machine

"After a short wait, a machine says " Your call may be recorded for training purposes. What name please?"

AAAGHHHH!!

Sorry. "

Now let's see if I have got this right, you said "AAAGHHHH sorry" to a machine ?

:-))

Doesnt it p i s s you off eh ?? I just get on there now an"say operator, then again "operator". I rang the other night for the Star City Casino's no as I wanted to know there height limit for the carpark, the recording asked me did I want Sydney Council ??? My reply was "for FU%# sake" cant I speak to a human, I was then put on hold and transferred to an operator who said to me,""Sir that language isnt appropriate" didnt know they could still hear me when talking to a machine lol. told her the new system was crap and is worse then before. Suppose I was lucky the operator could actually speak English...... WHG

Every time the machine starts to speak press the hash (#) key.

After a few times you will be put through to a human.

Whether the human will be any more helpful than the machine is a matter of chance.


Chris

If you put your thumb over the Phone Mic. Eventually you'll get put through to an operator.

Better still is ...........

After going through the process of wearing out your finger tips responding to inane digital voices as with other services ... the line goes dead or you get an engaged signal ............ pffffft.

Just wondering ... for the amount of times individuals have used te telstra service ... on how many occasions has the computer actually provided the CORRECT info ?????

Living in rural NSW means numerous calls to the coast sourcing items and as the local area phonebook doesnt provide those numbers ... telstra ( as far as Im concerned ) is obligated to.

On an average of two calls a month, requiring operater assistance over the past 24mnths or so - not once has this "service" - been able to do what it is advertised to do.

Even some of the human operaters on the other numbers are barely up to the challenge. Noticed how quickly they hang up after giving a number they presume you want ..... thats to complete the scam ... requiring another call ($) for further info .......

I too just keep repeating operater, operator, operater operator - as it stops me saying a lot of other words ... lolol

A few years ago (in between proper jobs after economic restructuring of an employer), I worked for a short time in a call centre for a telecommunications company …not Telstra. Anything to keep the mortgage paid!

Imagine sitting on phone for an eight hour shift (no rest breaks and a 30 minute lunch break which has to be taken according to call queue numbers) having to respond in a bright and cheery manner to calls coming in with a 10 second break between each call.

If your average call time exceeded the expectations set by management (at the time, 4 minutes 20 seconds) your team leader would take you aside (in your own time) for a motivational chat (bullying under the guise of job counselling).

The expectation was that you would respond to at least 90 calls per shift

In those 4 minutes 20 seconds, you had to identify the issue, work out a way to answer it, correct the issue and then communicate all this in a manner that the person understood. At the same time file notes had to be recorded.

All this on the minimum Award wage

Don’t start me on the people who believe that rudeness, swearing, personal insults and physical threats will automatically respect blue ribbon service, also that an amazing number of people do not appear to have the nous required to tie their shoe laces, let alone function in the 21st century

The company did not a complaints line…the customer service number was the complaints line. Management was insulated from customers by the poor bunnies on the phones

As customers, we are receiving the services we pay for. Any company is responding to its owners/shareholders by offering the minimum service at minimal cost to maximise profit. If workers in Australia cost too much the company will go off-shore

If the service provided is above the minimum we will pay more for it.

Of course, the best way to search for a number is White or Yellow Pages on line. If you have a Next G Telstra mobile phone this is a free service.

One of my colleagues at the time once made the observation; half the call centre jobs could be discarded with 2 options
1 “Read your bill”
2 “Pay your bill”

skulldug,
Did you call 1223?

I always use white pages on line, so haven't used directory assistance for many years For anything else with Telstra - i need to set aside around three day.

Years ago, when my work place first got internet (slow dial up, local server with limited lines so had to queue to get on line at all most days, and got tipped off as soon as your line was inactive), i used to have a 'race' with a colleague.

Every time i heard him on the phone to white pages giving a name, i would log onto the internet (eventually), white pages on line, name he had said. Usually i got the number same time as he did from the operator - on a good day i used to beat him.

When Telstra went from real person to voice recognition, it was even slower, as the system couldn't recognise his ever so slight English accent.

I don't know about now, but then, the list the operators had wasn't as up to date as the one i was getting one line - although your'd think they'd be using the same data base.


Motherhen

Don't we all love Telstra??

You don't mean like this do you.

Telstra Customer Service

.

and yet another reason why i will NEVER be a Telstra customer(phone) again ...

Boc

Must the accent you guys have over there!