"Your call is very important to us"- The Call center experience

What's your call center experience like?

"Thank for calling (COMPANY), your call is important to us"

"We are experiencing high call volumes"

"The next available representative will be with you shortly"

"The expected wait time is under 5 minutes"

"your call may be monitored and recorded for quality assurance/ training purposes"

I'm sure you have all heard of these lines before. It's like they are always busy when you call and no one is ever available to pick up the phone when you need something. I had quite the experience today calling in to my insurance company to cancel my current policy. I thought this would be a quick process that may take couple of minutes.... but I was wrong. After being on hold for 10 minutes I decide to call back around lunch time because I didn't want to be late for work.  Around 1PM I called back and was place on hold for 12 minutes. After patiently waiting, I finally got a live representative on the line. They took me through their security verification process with date of birth, SSN, address. After the verification process I told the lady I wanted to cancel my policy. She then ask me a series of questions about why I'm canceling it. At this time it was about 20 minutes into the call (almost half my lunch time wasted) She then tells me, "you mind if I place you on hold while I transfer you to our department who handles cancellation?" At this point I was furious! I didn't want to put back on hold again. Thankfully enough she got someone back on the line within a minute or so who then sent me paperwork through my email so I can fax the cancellation forms back.

TOTAL TIME WASTED TO CANCEL INSURANCE POLICY:  about 30 minutes! I wish they would have these forms online on their website!

COM'ON CALL CENTER REPS!!!

We don't want to be place on hold after a hold