"Who wants to be a supervisor?"

Like with any other service industry worker, a Technical Support Representative is someone you want to handle with care. Much like a server who could spit in your food if you piss them off a Tech. Support Rep. could banish you to the endless maze of voice prompts with one slip of the tongue.

I’m still amazed there are people out in this world who still think the service industry is there for them to use as their personal toilet. They are clueless to the power dynamic they have walked into. The people you’re dumping on are the ones who handle your food, your drinks, repair your car, answer your endless STUPID questions or fix your technical problems. It’s sort like handing an arsonist an unlit match then calling him an asshole. How do you think that’s going to end?

During my unfortunate incarceration on the technical support line, it would be almost a daily occurrence that someone would want to speak with a supervisor. This could be for any number of reasons; they didn’t like the answer they were given, or they had to wait too long to get a “real person.” Little did they know by the third hour of being on the phones any shred of a “real person” no longer existed in any of the representatives. In one case a customer wanted to speak to a supervisor because we dared put an expiration date on a coupon that came with their printer.

Most of the time the disturbed caller would just want to hear another voice because they’re tired of hearing the one which is giving them the CORRECT answer. So, we would provide them with another voice, a “supervisor” of sorts. Most of the time our supervisor was not available (she was also well-known “office ghost.”) When she wasn’t around whomever had the “hot customer” (yes, people that’s how you’re referred to in our systems with scrolling red lettered banner as if to the next poor soul know they were entering a mine field) would stand on their chair and announce, “Who wants to be a supervisor!?” At that time whoever was free would take the call from the poor tech. rep. who had been enduring whatever annoying “mouth breather” was on the other end of the line. Once the call was transferred to the “supervisor” a possibly explosive scenario turned into a Jekyll and Hyde situation. When the “supervisor” reluctantly picks up the line and says, “How may I help you?” the customer’s tone changes so fast you’d think you were being pranked by your fellow reps. By that time the supposedly “irate” customer is so full of sugar and spice and everything nice it’s a small wonder the “supervisor” doesn’t come out of the call with a cavity. In the end all that matters is the customer is satisfied and we’re rid of them.

People who work in any service industry are for the most part overworked and underpaid. A very small percentage of them want to be there. Most of the time it’s a matter of survival and they need the money. I was asked in an interview once, “Why do you want to work in technical support?” I replied, “No one really WANTS to work in technical support. There is not a person out there dreaming of a career where you’re leashed to a phone 8 hours a day while a nearly endless parade of annoyed (and often ignorant) people call to dump on you or personally blame you for their problems. All while someone in management controls when you get to go to the bathroom.”

These are, as a friend’s mother described as “soul destroying” jobs. The only benefit we have in these service positions is that we hold all the cards. We control how and when you get your problem resolved. So, before you decide to call in then get on your tight-assed high horse and unload whatever shit you have bottled up onto us, THINK! Remember, we could not care less what your issue is and by the time you get to us you’re just one of thousands of irritating voices we’ve heard that day! And know that after we’ve solved your insignificant problem you’ve become the butt of SO many jokes at one of our many WELL-EARNED happy hours. All we’ll remember of you is how you treated us and whether or not we had to gleefully banish you to phone prompt HELL! Which will buy us an hour of much needed peace. At which time we’re either downing a large amount of ibuprofen or updating our resumes. Either of which will dull the pain until the next call rolls in and we say those immortal words, “How may I help you?”