oh dear oh dear oh dear....
Did my work experience at the local theatre. Some of it was moderately interesting, but there were large chunks of very dull things, like answering the phones. Other than the apparent inability of anyone to LISTEN to the automated system (press one to go to the box office... that's 'one'... 1!!! No, I can't sell you any tickets. No, I can't tell you ticket prices. Just putting you through, madam...), there were dozens of identical phone calls that I was left to deal with... There'd been some bug with their new billing system, and lots of people had been charged twice for their tickets. However, this was refunded directly into their account 2 days later. Cue lots of irate people ringing up going 'You've charged me twice! It says so on my credit card statement! This is outrageous!' etc etc etc... and me going 'Erm, yes, but if you just look a little bit further down your statement you'll see where we've refunded you...' Most people were nice when they realised, but some decided to lay into me about the cheek of it all. I comforted myself with the fact I only had another week or so to put up with it, and also with one sweet old lady who brightened up the whole experience: 'Hello? Yes, you've given me some money! Why are you giving me money? I don't like to complain, but I do worry that you're being rather wasteful, dear...' Bless her, I had to explain the whole billing problem to her in reverse.

Also memorable was holiday work as a secretary in a tiny tiny company... The same woman kept ringing back, about six times in the course of one morning. EVERY time, she would ask to speak to who she had been speaking to before. EVERY time, I would explain that I was the only person who would be answering the phones. EVERY time, she was mistrustful of me, and seemed to truly believe I was lying. Thing is, all she ever wanted was transferring to somebody else. Why would it even matter if she got some other initial phone monkey!?
( kikilookeylikey, Wed 31 Dec 2003, 12:17, Reply)