Comment on Daily discussion thread: 👾 Tuesday, May 14, 2024

• StudChud@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I’ve worked in call centres for 10-12 years, electricity, tax collection, salary packaging/sacrifice, and a small business that did home services. All sucked in their own unique ways. The only way to move “up” is to be toxic as fuck and throw your coworkers under the bus, which I couldn’t do. The abuse from management, the abuse from callers, caused me to abuse myself.

  So done, 0/10, do not reccomend. Taking calls all day is a form of torture.

  Gonna be doing animal care instead, cert III, and then I’ll move up to the cert IV in veterinary nursing. It’ll be hard, but I won’t be on the phones; I’ll be doing something that has been my dream.

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  • Nath@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I worked for an ISP help desk for years. I loved it.

    I think my experience was a bit different to most phone work though. All the calls were initiated by customers. Even when I was calling outbound, it was as a follow up to someone who wanted to speak to me. Also, we were helping people, so they’d be happy and grateful at the end of the call.

    Finally, it was the 90’s - the Internet users were far more technical than the average person today. I could walk most callers through their computer/modem settings pretty easily.

    There might still be phone work out there that doesn’t crush your soul. I don’t think it’s the work itself that’s awful, rather the setting they do that work in and your coworkers/employer that are the problem.

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    • dumblederp@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I did four years ISS tech support and I think I’d eat out of bins before going back.

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      • StudChud@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Same 100%

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    • StudChud@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I wish it was just coworkers/management

      I’ve had customers scream at me, threaten to unalive themselves or me, threaten to shoot me, masturbate on calls, speak to me like I was a phone sex worker, call me every name under the sun, tell me I’m a bad person and I should unalive myself, and threaten their own children.

      Had some spout qanon stuff, and scream about 5g causing cancer while using their mobile to conduct the call. Scream that lefties are ruining the country.

      Had people tell me that land tax is stupid and not know what it goes towards (roads, infrastructure, schools, were my answer), that it was just funding trans people to abuse children 🙄. Scream about having to sell their investment properties (not my fault). Some spoke down to me, or call me racist names because they though I was an immigrant (I’m not, not that it makes it okay).

      Threaten to find me and rape me, wanted me to tell them my last name, tell them my home address, call me queer slurs. Ask me out, ask me to talk dirty to them, and demand I do something against company policy.

      All this because I was just doing my job, or I was taking too long, or I told them they had to pay xyz bill, or tell them it would take X time for payment to be received/refund to land. Never told anyone my political leanings, never provoked them. I think you lucked out, because these days people have gotten worse and worse.

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      • dumblederp@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        I found people were more aggressive to me as a CSR than as a bouncer.

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      • Nath@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        So by the end, I was a (middle) manager of the staff on the phones. I had the power to “fire” customers. I would not have hesitated to close the account of a customer, making them get a new Internet Provider/email address for any of this. Our people were worthy of respect and our customers knew it. Or they weren’t our customers any longer.

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  • melbaboutown@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Hey, I don’t want to bring you down but please take care with your mental health with animal care/vet nursing as well. It’s a customer facing job where some owners can be challenging, and events upsetting or traumatic. I’m hoping it’s better than on call, just saying to be prepared to have a support network and a plan for when things are tough.

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