'I decide to go full loophole': Bank branch worker helps customer stuck in phone call loop

Author image for Remy Millisky
Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Jun 11, 2024 5:00 PM EDT

This person deserves a medal after spending ages helping one customer. If not a medal, they at least deserve some kudos from their boss for taking the time to help a Spanish-speaking customer figure out her way around a complex phone system. 

In a customer service role, employees often have to help people who are straight-up mean to them. They call when they're angry or annoyed already, and they start demanding that the employee solve every one of their problems instantly. It must've been a nice break from that for this worker at a bank branch: instead of having an upset customer, this poor lady just needed a lot of extra help. 

I'm sure this woman will never forget the act of kindness that u/GTAIVisbest showed her. This employee could've easily dismissed her problems. Instead, they write that they "really want to help," and went above and beyond to prove it. They could've easily dismissed this woman's problems, but she certainly needed the extra help, and was lucky to have such an accommodating employee on her side. 

After that, check out the employee who had a crafty way of supplying a photo for HR without actually getting his face in the picture, writing that he "went for another technicality." 

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  • 01
    Cheezburger Image 10359765760
    via Hannah Wei on Unsplash
  • 02
    The most arduous game of Human Phone Centipede ever played in branch Today, an elderly spanish- speaking client presented to the branch, and since I'm the only one in the branch that is somewhat fluent in Spanish, I sat down with her at the benches to try to figure out what she was so upset about.
    via u/
  • 03
    It turns out that she has a car loan with us, and recently our consumer lending department started charging her a sizable fee every month to forcefully add insurance to the loan. She was shocked and confused because she has had comprehensive insurance for a long time. She brought with her two declaration pages from Progressive, showing that the car had had comprehensive coverage since November of last year. Perfect, right?
    via u/
  • 04
    Well, I send these documents over to the back office and phone them. "Oh, sorry. We cannot accept these documents. We are not listed as the lienholder". Huh, they're right. The area where "lienholder" points to is blank on the pages, how very strange. Darn it! Well, I talk to the lady, and tell her she'll have to go home, call Progressive, and get them to resend documents. It turns out she works irregular hours at multiple part-time jobs
    via u/
  • 05
    just to survive. She has to rely on a friend to bring her to the bank. She has no transportation. She doesn't know the next time she'll be able to come over to see us in order to get everything figured out, and if we don't get these insurance fees refunded she'll go DELINQUENT on the loan and get reported to the credit bureaus! I tell her, ok, no problem. We're not too busy and I really want to help, so I'll let her call Progressive and ask them to
    via u/
  • 06
    send the documents to our bank email. Then, I can scan these up directly to the back-office and we'll be all set! I tell her to call, press "7" for spanish, and then when it comes time to give the email, I'll tell her what it is. She calls and juts the phone towards me and asks me to take over. Now, in my bank, we have a pretty strict policy: we are NOT allowed to speak over the phone to a third party on behalf of a client. Of course, it makes sense.
    via u/
  • 07
    It's a liability thing, and I totally understand, so I warned her. I said, I won't be able to talk directly to them. I'll read out the email to you, and you'll just read it out to them. She gets through the wait queue and is connected to an agent, but in English. She says "panish please" and gets transferred.... to the very back of the same queue she entered from. She keeps getting connected to English- speaking agents and keeps
    via u/
  • 08
    asking for Spanish and keeps getting transferred over and over. She's getting upset and impatient, and I can tell she is on the verge of crying. I decide to go FULL loophole in order to help this poor lady. While we can't talk to a third party, we can't prevent our client from talking to the third party. And if our client wants to repeat everything we say to the third party, we can't prevent that. And if the client wants to put her
    via u/
  • 09
    phone on speaker and lay it on the counter while we loudly tell her something, we also can't prevent that (as long as our client says she's ok with it, of course). So I bring her to a private office, close the door, and then have her put the agent on speaker. I tell her I'm going to say words to her in Spanish, and I need her to just repeat the words I'm saying phonetically back to the phone. "Please."
    via u/
  • 10
    "BLEASE" "don't." "DONET" "transfer." "TRANASFIER" "me." "..... EH ME" "to the"
    via u/
  • 11
    "Toua... the?" "Queue" "QUE?" Word by word, I have her repeat over the phone that the queue system for spanish is not working, and I'd like help getting some documents. This was THE MOST arduous game of telephone ever, because we had to go word-by-word so that the elderly client could (somewhat)
    via u/
  • 12
    correctly repeat it. Of course, it didn't matter, because the Progressive agent was able to hear ME fine and clear, and even asked to speak directly to me multiple times. But through the client I had her explain that "BANQUERE CAN NUOT PEAK DIRECTAMENTE TO JUO ON PHONE". I could have just dropped the act and started speaking to the progressive agent directly, but I suppose their telephone calls are recorded and
    via u/
  • 13
    I wanted to make sure I was covering my 1. God bless the client, she gave it her all. And you know what? Progressive agent played along, and 5 minutes later we had updated declaration pages showing us as the lienholder. Amazing! The client was extremely embarrassed at not being able to speak english, but I hugged her and told her that I felt the exact same way when I was learning Spanish. I reassured her and told
    via u/
  • 14
    her that her extra insurance fees would be refunded by next week. She left the branch happy and misty-eyed, meanwhile I went to the break room to splash cold water on my face and try to give myself motivation to go out there and finish the rest of my day
    via u/
  • 15
    chaos-possum Everyone deserves a little grace, and that you could do that while not compromising yourself is amazing. Props to you and the agent that took that call.
    via u/chaos-possum
  • 16
    Chili440 Why does she have no transportation AND a car loan?
    via u/Chili440
  • 17
    dowhatsrightalwa... You did great!
    via u/dowhatsrightalways
  • 18
    gallerie GTA. You seriously need an award for best customer service in the world.
    via u/gallerie
  • 19
    mindofsunlight Now THIS is outstanding customer service. Well done. You deserve a whole mental health day to relax and recharge after all that!
    via u/mindofsunlight
  • 20
    theatottot You're amazing. I try to do the same thing to my clients and it is very tiring but fulfilling.
    via u/theatottot
  • 21
    thatburghfan You deserve much good karma for how you handled that, and didn't let the "rules" make you give up. Kudos!
    via u/thatburghfan
  • 22
    msaid93 Great job, OP! The customer left satisfied and relieved knowing that the issue is resolved and that's what matters. I bet she was very appreciative that you took the time to do what you did.
    via u/msaid93

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