33 Overworked Telemarketers Reveal The Worst Thing A Customer Has Said To Them
1. Not a telemarketer, but…
Call center in India called me repeatedly selling counterfeit Cialis. “Do you have trouble getting it up in the bedroom?” To which I replied… “No, but I am curious. If you eat out an indian woman does her cunt taste like curry?” Without missing a beat the caller replied “No man. Its more like a mint Chutney.”
I’m not even mad. That was awesome.
2. Took him two years of prep work
“Of course you decided to call now. THAT WAS THE FIRST ERECTION I’VE HAD IN OVER TWO YEARS!”
I laughed, cuz I thought he was joking. To which he replied:
“You think it’s funny, asshole? Here, I’m gonna put my wife on the phone, so you can apologize to her.”
He hands the phone to his wife, and I’m just frozen… The most I can manage is “ummmm..”
And she says to me: “Don’t worry sweetheart, his erections ain’t nothin’ to write home ’bout anyhow.”
3. A gaping hole
“Fuck yourself with the wide end of a rake.”
4. I hope it wasn’t recorded for “training” purposes
“I wish that you and everyone at the board at [your company] had been in World Trade Center on 9/11.”
It was a completely unexpected comment out of the blue, expressed with a very calm tone, so I just thought it was a hilarious. We ended up having a fairly long and amusing chat about in how many ways [my company] sucked.
5. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I sold the Disney Channel when I was in college. Cold calling people with cable, asking them to pick up extra channels. One woman told me the only one in her house who watched tv was her grandfather, and all he watched was cartoons and porn.
I sold her the Disney Channel.
$.25 commission, baby.
6. Not a telemarketer, but…
I once told a telemarketer to set himself on fire. I felt really bad the next day and I called to apologize.
7. A thinly veiled…compliment…?
It wasn’t particularly mean but someone once told me to shove a giant black dick up my ass. Then he said he’s not racist but the black ones were bigger.
8. RedditName
Last Easter, I was having major issues with my internet service. Through many calls and tireless on holds, I managed to keep a friendly disposition to the people in the call center for Comcast support.
This is how my favorite one went.
Thick Indian accent: “Hello, this Comcast service. How help you?”
“Ahh, hey man. My internet service is restricted and I can’t access anything…”
“Ok, let me redirect you to a different specialist.”
“Thanks man! So, hows your Easter going?”
“My wife is in the hospital… I am trying to get a check for bills.”
“Oh my god, I am so sorry.”
He begins crying: “I don’t like job. You only friendly person I have talk to. Than-”
Call transfers
It really shows how hard it is for them. I feel really bad.
9. Phone numbers are used to verify your identity
I worked inbound for Bell South. I once had a guy call me to add Call Waiting to his account. I asked him for his phone number. He flipped the fuck out and went on a three minute long rant about people asking for his phone number for things, and how we all wanted to track him and his private business, and that I was a conniving bitch in collusion with the government. As he started to run out of steam, he spat out, “Who the hell do you think you are, asking for my phone number?”
Panicked, I responded, “Um, the phone company?”
Yeah, that didn’t go over well.
10. They’re human, too
Semi related: I was once told by a telemarketer to go fuck myself.
11. How can you tell if someone is fat over the phone
Customer: You sound fat
Me: …I… I am. :(
12. If it pays…
“Get a real Job!”
That shit hurts, guys.
13. So…don’t work for Bell South, huh
Not me, but the guy at the station next to mine who always had his earphones turned up ridiculously loud. We did inbound calls, and sometimes if the Spanish language operators were busy, we got their overflow. We had a script that began, in Spanish, “Thank you for calling Bell South.” Guy next to me was struggling his way through it, absolutely butchering the pronunciation (Grassy-ass pour yammer ah Bell South.) and the guy on the other end of the line was laughing like crazy. The script continued, “I’m sorry, but I do not speak Spanish.”
The customer, still laughing his ass off replied in English, “I noticed!”
Okay, so maybe not exactly mean, but I still remember the look on the guy’s face, as if he was honestly shocked that somebody found his pronunciation amusing.
14. Working two jobs to make ends meet and a dickhead tells me to get a life?
I was having a rough day already, some prick southern American hick (I was in Canada doing telephone surveys) told me to get a real fucking job and a real fucking life. I told him I’m trying to earn a living and hung up on him. Had to put myself in personal, went outside and teared up my while smoking half a pack of cigs.
15. That’s really shitty
Years ago I was working as a telemarketer which called on behalf of various charities selling raffle tickets.
Please for the love of all that is good, DO NOT DEAL WITH ‘most’ OF THESE PEOPLE. It was basically a sweat shop rented out to both worthy and dubious charities, the call center gets the majority of the money raised. Commissions commissions commissions!
One week there were devastating floods in part of the country, the whole nation was sympathetic and on edge. Yet, some of the worst affected areas were on our call list that day.
I had to sit and call home after home of people who had just lost everything they owned, asking if they wanted to buy raffle tickets…. I’ve blocked out the horrible things they said, though every one of them was warranted. I knew I was just adding insult to injury.
The pit manager put a leader board up that day to keep track of who was earning the highest commissions off these people.
I quit that day.
Fuck those guys.
16. What the hell
When I worked in collections my region to call was NYC and New Jersey. The company forced us to continue making collection calls through Hurricane Sandy. It was just miserable.
17. “Nazi bitch”
I’m sorta close to one of those, I’m in tech support for a major cable company who is pretty much hated by everyone…I once got called a nazi bitch.. but I’ve also been called a lacky, an idiot and a minion.
18. He made fun of her for crying?!
I was working for a research based children’s cancer charity. The money raised went right towards clinical trials, not just raising awareness. I had a guy call me a pathetic cunt for exploiting sick children to make money for ourselves. And several variants of that. It went on for 45 minutes. I was 18 at the time, inexperienced in dealing with the assholes of the world. Despite trying to explain to him how we really worked, by the end of it I was bawling my eyes out, and he was making fun of me for crying.
19. On the first day
From a single call on my very first day:
“What the fuck do you mean you can’t give me the number? BULLSHIT.”
“You are a fucking despicable person.”
“All you call centre people are the same- everything is black and white to you, you don’t care about anyone who is on the phone you just care about your fucking pay check, you soulless bastards.”
“You are an awful employee and you should be fucking fired. You never should have been hired in the first place, you incompetent piece of shit. You don’t deserve a job.”
“Put your damn manager on the phone, I’m going to tell them how god-fucking awful you are and ask them to fire you. I can’t BELIEVE this shit, you fucking idiot.”
This wasn’t a telemarketer job, but still in a call centre. Last summer I worked for a company that is hired to make the campsite reservations for the national parks in my country.
On my very first day on the job after my two weeks of training there was major flooding out west and a lot of campsites in the parks in that area were closed down or inaccessible. Some major highways were completely flooded, people’s homes were ruined, and many areas had to be evacuated.
I had a man call me asking if his son had checked in to his campsite- he couldn’t get a hold of him and wanted to know if he was okay. First of all, we don’t have that information in the call centre- we just know if a reservation exists or not- the parks deal with check ins/outs. I told him that and said that we had no information about check ins. He started talking about how that is “fucking ridiculous” and saying that I was an incompetent employee.
Next he asked for the contact information for the park his son was supposed to be at. I could give him the address and the national parks’ hotline, but due to federal privacy law as well as our contract with the parks we are not able to give out the direct telephone numbers to the parks (we do have them, and they aren’t online for the public). I told him that I could give him the address and the hotline but he demanded the park’s number. I apologized and told him I couldn’t, and I explained that it’s against our contract and against federal privacy law. I told him that I could transfer him to the park if I could get a hold of them, but I just couldn’t give him the number. He said he wanted the number so he could keep calling and checking. He started to swear at me and yell, and then scream a whole bunch of things, including what I listed above. I told him that it was my first day and I asked him to please stop with that kind of language as I would have to end the call and he cut me off – “Put your damn manager on the phone, I’m going to tell them how god-fucking awful you are and ask them to fire you. I can’t BELIEVE this shit, you fucking idiot”.
I was terrified. He was screaming at me and he was furious. It was my very first day, and I knew that the company could be sued if I gave the number to him. I told him to please wait on hold while I got my manager on the phone, and he went off again. Once I had him on hold I got my superior on the line and as I was transferring him through I accidentally dropped the call- I mixed up the buttons I had to push because I had never done a transfer before, only seen it demonstrated once during training.
I wasn’t scheduled for a break then but I logged out and went to the bathroom and spent a good ten minutes getting myself to stop crying and shaking. It was awful. I know that he was just worried about his son and he was taking it out on me, but holy crap he was just so MEAN.
I had several other experiences like that (albeit not as severe as this one) where the customer started to scream and swear and was cruel over something that I had no control over, like the cancellation policy or the pricing. I was offered a position to return this summer and needless to say I turned them down.
20. Geez, people are awful over the phone
I got called a Fenian Irish Cunt by somebody from the UK a few years back. That’s probably up there with one of the worst things he could have said. People act differently when they are on the phone. They have a shield and it turns some into horrible people.
21. >:(
“I’m going to break your legs and piss on your mom’s grave.”
22. At least there were some funny things
Meanest thing said to me – “I hope you outlive your children.” That one cut to the bone.
I did telemarketing for an energy supply company selling boiler insurance. The job definitely taught me how to have a thick skin but that one was just horrendous. Few funnies though. “Well mate I can either sit here and chat to you about boilers or I can have sex with my wife…what do you think I’m gonna do?” My response “Fair play sir, all the best”
23. Apparently telemarketers are devil incarnates
Not a telemarketer, but I used to be a bill collector. In that line of work, one hears a lot of voice mail greetings. One of the people I had to call almost daily, who sounded like an older Southern woman, had a greeting that said “If you are a friend or family, please leave a message and I will call you at my convenience. Have a blessed day. If you are a bill collector, hang up now. I rebuke you in the name of Jesus!” Glad I never spoke with her in person.
24. There was a good, happy ending to this one
When I was 18 working to pay for university I worked at a call center for a small local charity. Some woman said “You should be ashamed of yourself, calling people in the name of charity, using it as a cover to sell slave labour cheap rubbish. I bet you get paid for this, I bet you get commision. You are the problem. You are everything thats wrong with the world. You are using the name of charity to get what you want. If you genuinely believed in this cause, you would work for free.”
I apologized for calling her, explained that I am sorry she feels that way, and that as a charity we have tried having people work from their own good will without pay, but sadly the charity would go out of business within a week if we did this as the sad truth is that no one wants to work for free. I explained that I took this job as, after touring the factory etc, I saw that they were doing good work. I encouraged her to come and see us. I also said that if she felt so strongly, perhaps she would be willing to come and help with her free time without pay. To help a good cause. She hung up on me.
She called back about 2 hours later and bought a huge package of stuff, she apologized for being mean, and even come along to view the factory a few weeks later.
I will always remember that one.
25. Her favorite movie
Someone from the Republican National convention called to get us to vote Bush. We put the phone up by a surround sound speaker while watching Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. We go outside to skate, come back and she’s still on the line. She wanted us to put the movie back on and told us it was her favorite. We asked her why she had that job. “11 bucks an hour is 11 bucks an hour.”
26. Father for father
I have worked for Verizon in customer care and call center politics require you to do a “save offer” before you terminate a line of service. It’s this way because it looks bad on that call center if it has 2% higher rates of disconnects compared to another.
So one time a boss of mine was pissed and I asked her if I could terminate a line of service without doing a save offer because this family’s father died a month ago and finally were ready to drop the line. However my boss said No. I must make that save by saying we can give an iPad cell service using that number. After being threatened with a write up because I didn’t want to do it, I did my schtick and the Lady got pissed and insulted by my offer.
So she says to me “I hope your father dies so you know how it feels.”
16 days later, my father died, suicide. I don’t work for Verizon anymore.
27. Damn, owned
Someone told me they would kill and rape my mother if I ever called him again. I asked, “In that order?” He got mad and asked if I was getting smart with him. I said, “Sir, you just said you were going to murder my mother and violate her corpse.”
“Yes, I’m getting smart with you, asshole.”
I then set his number on repeat with a call back every 15 minutes.
28. If the system doesn’t allow it, what can you do
I had a woman service member tell me that I was a worthless piece of shit and I have no respect for service members because I said I can’t ship to an APO (my system will not process an order if it’s a PO box, or military APO address). It was a few weeks after a friend of mine was killed in Iraq. I threw my headset at the wall while she was still on the phone and left my seat to go smoke a cigarette.
29. Does it relieve the itch?
I was told to “pound sand up my ass” today. I’m still quite not too sure what he really wanted me to do.
30. That’s pretty creative
“I hope your arms shrink, while you have an itch on your back. kinda messed with me all day.”
31. He has the mouth of a sailor
Call up an 88-year-old man. Tell him my whole script as he waits patiently. When I’m done, he says, “That’s great, honey, now I have a suggestion for you.”
I say, “Sure!”
And he replies with these exact words: “You should go take a piece of sandpaper, roll it up to the size of a cock, and shove it up your cunt.”
I was sixteen years old and so blown away that I just sat there with my mouth agape until he hung up on me.
32. Wow, old lady, get fucked
I had what sounded like a little old lady tell me to get closer to the phone because she was having trouble hearing me. She kept asking, “Are you really close? Can you get closer?”
Then she blew a fog horn in to her handset and told me to go fuck myself…
33. Telemarketers are just trying to make a living — like door-to-door salesmen
To qualify: I’ve only done calls to business, never to consumers at home.
I’ve never had a single bad phone call, where someone is a total douche. Never one. I rarely have hangups. Everyone at least listens to the pitch.
However, I think people might be under a misguided notion of their being able to hurt me with their words. I calculate total revenue I earn per month and divide it by the total phone calls made. I then calculate my revenue per phone call. If each phone call is $20, then the more phone calls I make, the more money. I don’t care what you say.
You can say anything and it is money in the bank, average dollar-wise. You might not buy, but someone down the road will, but it averages out, so you actually do buy, in that sense.
The only thing someone can do to fuck with a professional like me is to pretend like they are buying and stretch out the phone call for an hour. But that wastes your time then.
But don’t do this. I’m exactly like you. I’m not wanting to fuck with you. I’m providing a legit service and products. Just say, “Hey, thanks, but I’m not interested, sorry.” And then hang up. I swear I’m just hard at work, trying to earn a living, not pushing shady shit. So why fuck with me? I gave you the only thing to mess with me. I’m baring my jugular, yeah? So let’s all chill and try to make ends meet in this world.
