I am a 59 year old experienced professional. Recently, the company I was working for closed its doors, and I was out of work. I needed to clarify my COBRA coverage, so I called the customer service number on the back of my Giant Insurance Company card. Sounds so simple?
I needed to talk to a real person. I had questions that could not be answered by searching Giant Insurance’s website. So with trepidation, I dialed the number.
Every call to Giant Insurance begins with the same message “Welcome to Giant Insurance, your call is very important to us”. That should have been the tip off that it is impossible to talk to anyone at Giant Insurance. As do about 99% of the companies in the United State, Giant uses a phone tree – the technological marvel that has replaced the receptionist or switchboard operator. Now, if you need to talk to them, instead of getting a live voice who can screen your call and route it to the right person if we’re nice, you get set of incomprehensible instructions. These directions are designed to prevent your call from ever reaching a human who could help you.
After the perfunctory greeting, every phone tree follows up with the same message, “Please listen carefully, as our options have changed”. From when – 10 minutes ago, or two years ago?. It doesn’t matter, they are telling you, in their gentle way, that calling is a waste of time.
After the greeting, you move to the language portion of the phone tree. This part thrills linguists everywhere. Now you can listen while they repeat the same message in 23 different languages. You are comforted by the fact that not only is Giant Insurance not talking to you in English, but they are equally adept at not talking to you in 22 other languages, ranging from Spanish and Vietnamese to Sanskrit and Ancient Egyptian.
Next is very unsubtle message that your call is useless. How do they do they convey that? It’s the message “Much more information is available at www.giantinsurance.com”. I have spent 30 years in technology; I am very current in my computer skills. If the answer to my question was available on the internet, would I be making this call?
Now that your call has been affirmed as useless, you move on to the options messages portion of the phone tree. You listen to a list of options, none of which is relevant to your question. Messages such as “Press 1 to hear current balance due” and “Press 2 to order identification cards” won’t help figure out how to extend your COBRA. Since none are promising that you will get through to a customer service rep, you randomly press a number, any number, hoping to move to the next step. It doesn’t matter – your choice always leads to additional confusing and irrelevant options. Here’s a hint, write down the options you’ve chosen, so that your next time through, you won’t make the same mistakes. That’s right, since 95% of the options lead to a dead end, there will be a next time. You can press 3 or you can press 7, but neither leads to the customer service representative.
Now what? You are left with no choice but to start all over again. You will go through this exercise multiple times. Now assume that you do successfully figure out the phone tree – you hear a message, “Press 6 to talk to a customer service representative”. Eagerly, you press 6.
What now. Do you talk to the promised customer service representative? Not yet. You are now informed that you have picked a poor time to call. How do you know that – you get the message “due to unprecedented call volumes, we are experiencing longer than usual wait times, and we will answer your call in the order it was received. Try calling at another time”. It’s taken me an hour to get this far, there is no way I am going to call again at another time. Since the message is applicable 24/7, when is a good time to call?
I have ignored all of their warnings and messages and it seems that I may get through and actually talk to someone. After waiting on hold at least 30 minutes, they have told me that I will now speak to a representative. I hear a click. Instead of the promised representative, the phone goes dead. This actually happened twice, but since I am a glutton for punishment, unemployed, desperate, and with too much time on my hands, I try a third time, and actually get a live, semi-coherent human.
Will I get help? Are you kidding? We all know that every customer service center in the world has been outsourced to North Elbonia, where they speak Elbostani, and that everyone in North Elbonia is named either John or Mary. They have been taught to speak only every other word in English. You are never sure of what is really being said. They have also been taught to ask questions which are completely irrelevant to the reason that you have called – like “Would you like me to send you another identification card” or “do you know your account balance”. If I had wanted either, I could have done that over the internet, without talking to you, or done it on the telephone, two hours ago, by pressing 6. Help me solve my problem.
How does this story end? I am not quite sure. I have muddled through, and have been accepted as a paying member of Giant Insurance, but at a much higher rate which I can not really afford, and with far fewer benefits. I have also gained new respect for them. They ingeniously figured out how to spend millions of our premium dollars to develop a system to avoid ever responding to a question. Won’t they be equally as adept at never paying claims?
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