'That's what she wants to have': Customer insists on paying more money for smaller cell phone plan after refusing to listen to customer service rep

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Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Aug 16, 2023 5:00 PM EDT

As a sales person, this employee still has to field a lot of customer service calls. Due to a mix up with the phone systems' phrasing, lots of confused customers get sent to u/d**nknife's phone line. They shared one story of a customer who just could not understand what they were paying for on their phone plan. I guess the customer isn't always right after all. 

If you've ever talked to someone who's worked a customer service phone operator job, they'll tell you that it takes some strategy. They say it helps to get into a rhythm, since you'll be saying the same few phrases over and over again all day. Then, you have to try not to get upset at the customers on the other end of the line. That part takes some skill! 

These reps say, anecdotally, that they pretend to play a character who can never, ever get angry or upset. They'll never raise their voice or sound frustrated if they're a professional. It still must be a frustrating job at times, even with the best imagination possible. 

Check out this story below. Then, read about why this guy reported his neighbor to local officials — all over a pile of brush. 

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  • 01
    Font - "I pay for 500MB I want 500MB" S I work on a telecom sales line but most of our calls are customer care or technical that end up pressing the wrong buttoon because they use a super strange phrasing so people get confused and we are obligated to try to sell them things. So most of the job is just transfer call to other lines.
    via u/d**nknife
  • 02
    Font - So this lady calls Lady: "I want to know how many MB I have on my plan" Me: "well, you apparently have 16 GB" L:"But in my contract it says I have 500MB" M:"Yes, but when you subscribed you must have gotten some special deal, but don't worry 16GB is a lot better than 500MB"
    via u/d**nknife
  • 03
    Font - The lady then gets really upset screaming if she pays for 500MB that's what she wants to have. I ask her to wait till I transfer, I talk to my colleague in customer care before transfer just to tell her that this is what the customer wants and to her not even bother to explain that 16GB is better than 500MB.
    via u/d**nknife
  • 04
    Font - Out of curiosity I took a look at her data usage and most of their cellphones expend somewhere between 2 to 4 GB, so she will pay at least 20 or 30 Euros in extras from now on.
    via u/d**nknife
  • 05
    Font - Edit: just to clarify, English is not my first language so it kind of got lost in translation, I didn't just said "16 gb is better" it would be more accurate "16gb is way more than 500mb" and her issue was to have anything different than what was in the contract
    via u/d**nknife
  • 06
    Font - Edit2: you guys are a tough audience, Jesus, to clarify even further this happened a couple of months ago and I believe I said something like "you have 16gbs, which is like 32x what you pay for, but it's free since it was a limited time offer when you subscribed", she then said she didn't want it anyway...
    via u/d**nknife
  • 07
    Font - timbofoo I wonder if you'd called it "16000MB" if the user would've had the same flip-out.
    via u/timbofoo
  • 08
    Font - uppercasemad I was thinking the same thing, chances are she doesn't know the difference between GB and MB, only that 16 is less than 500.
    via u/uppercasemad
  • 09
    Font - tkir My old work we had someone ask out loud in front of most of head office if a gigabyte was smaller or bigger than a megabyte. This guy happened to be the Director of Web Sales, and our company sold mobile phones and contracts. To say it went quiet was a bit of an understatement.
    via u/tkir
  • 10
    Font - Treepolice666 I worked in a Panera and one time I gave a lady a large cup instead of a small one because she had to wait a little longer during lunch rush and she flipped out on me saying it wasn't what she paid for. I kind of gave her the worst look I could without getting in trouble, and gave her a small cup
    via u/Treepolice666
  • 11
    Font - forcedinduction Why didn't you tell her 16 gb is 16,000 mb, and that she uses 4000 mb, and if she switched to 500 mb there will be overages? 39 Harflin Reply Share He said 16GB is better. That should be enough to prompt the customer to ask for details if desired. So I say fu 'em.
    via u/forcedinduction
  • 12
    Font - SilentCetra As I work in retention, I would LOVE this call. "okay, cool, let me take the extra data you are getting away. There, done. Also, you can now expect to be getting overages of 15 dollars oer gb you go over. Have a nice day! " Queue malicious compliance, baby!
    via u/SilentCetra
  • 13
    Font - da knife OP I think retention is the only line who would get more stupid calls than mine. Sometimes I would transfer some ppl who paid like 40 Euros for a full service and 2 mobile and they said if we didn't offer "a better deal" they will cancel because "I've being loyal to X since I got my first cable service 20 years ago".
    via u/d**nknife
  • 14
    Font - My colleagues in retention told me they usually just proceed with the cancellation and as soon as the person sees they are really getting what they asked for they would ask for some time to think better and never call again.
    via u/d**nknife
  • 15
    Font - EticketJedi I've had variances of this exact conversation a few times. We have a tendency every couple years or so to increase the amount of data on our plans without increasing the rates. The amount of people who think we're trying to get something over on them is staggering. Most understand it but I've had a few that just didn't get it no matter what I said.
    via u/EticketJedi
  • 16
    Font - capn_kwick Her reasoning is probably the same as those that insist that 1/4 is larger than 1/2 "since 4 is obviously larger than 2". I wonder in you had said "you have 16000 mb", would she have understood 16000 vs 500? Or would she be fixated on the contract terms to the exclusion of everything else?
    via u/capn_kwick
  • 17
    Font - [deleted] I work in cable and I know this pain all too well. "I pay for 100 megabytes per second but im only getting 14 megabytes per second, you need to fix this!" "Ma'am you pay for 100 megabits per second which is roughly 12 Megabytes per second, you're getting around 10% more than what you're paying for"
    via u/deleted
  • 18
    Font - "Bites Bytes I dont care you need to fix this" "Imma just write down in my notes "customer is a fting moron, charge them 60 for a superfluous service call"
    via u/deleted
  • 19
    Font - 2059FF Why didn't you put it in her terms? "You're already getting all the 500 MB you're paying for, and we're throwing in 15,500 extra MB for free." The lady clearly has no idea what MB and GB are, and she thought you were pulling a fast one on her. Probably she has been burned in the past by a fast-talking representative from the phone company. I can't blame her for being suspicious.
    via u/2059FF

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customer service cell phones call center jobs tech support work stories smartphones work customers phone sales tales-from-call-centers workplace Tech calling
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