It Was Just a Little Phone Problem

So, we needed to make a business call to clear up a question and make a payment. Easy, right? Automated systems make this kind of thing a piece of cake, and besides, big business is customer oriented these days, knowing that how they handle customers can prove to be a boost or a drag on their profits. And shareholders don’t like drags. (Note: ask General Motors stockholders how happy they are over GM’s recall of 28-million vehicles for safety-related issues. THIS YEAR.)

Anyway, we called on Saturday morning to this very big business — just for the sake of this discussion, let’s call it Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Hampshire — to ask our question and make our payment. We were greeted by an automated welcome directing us to several options. As we followed those automated instructions, we were directed by a non-human to several other options. And those in turn led us to the last option, finally, after a mere 10 minutes or so. That brought us the news — delivered by a slightly cheerful disembodied robotic voice — that Blue Cross — oops, just pretend it was Blue Cross, okay? — was closed for the weekend. We should try again during weekday hours, approximately 11 a.m. to 11:15 a.m. (just kidding).

Actually, we tried again on Monday morning around 11 a.m. just for the heck of it. After a series of options presented by that same modestly cheerful non-humanoid voice, we were placed on a hold for 15 minutes. Truth be told — and we’re being truthful here — Blue Cross — oops, again — didn’t cut us off. They just didn’t answer. We stayed on hold for those 15 minutes while being thanked time and again for our patience. That was heartwarming, but after 15 unanswered minutes, we had to go.

Monday afternoon we tried again. It was a little after 2. We went though some of the same series of options before settling in for a bout of terrible music and that voice thanking us once more for our unrelenting patience. About 45 minutes later, our patience, however much appreciated, was — to be honest about it — faltering. After one hour and five minutes, it disappeared altogether.

just before we hit the one hour and 20 minute mark, our plea and our call was answered by what seemed to be a female human with a female human-sounding voice. We greeted her with the almost as much fervor one welcomes a son back from the wars. In a relatively short period of time, this pleasant Blue Cross representative — darn it, sorry about that — answered our question and took our payment. Just like that. We were now free to move on with our little lives.

Adding up the toll, it came to about two hours on the phone to ask one question and make one payment. Now we know our little lives don’t count for much in the big scheme of things, and that was rudely amplified for us by this experience with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Hampshire (or whatever). We have learned our lessons: Don’t ask questions. Don’t ask anything, just pay. Big business is very busy.

We’ll really try to remember those lessons. Especially when October gets here.