A Night/Morning From H###

Last week I went through tech training (meaning if you were to call in with a remote or receiver or wiring problem, you could be transferred to me). Last night was my first night on the phones taking these calls. First of all, they suck!

I am used to having an average call time of about 5 or 6 minutes. I think most of the calls I took last night were more than 20 minutes. That totally raises my average. UGH!

Most of the people that call in either don't understand simple instructions like, "Press the TV mode button until all of the mode buttons light up," or they are just too lazy to even try something like unplugging the receiver to reset it. Then there are the people that have just enough information to make them dangerous. They call in already having done a lot of things that sometimes are not even necessary and could even prolong the process. When one problem is fixed they seem to somehow cause another problem. (Like I said, it sucks!)

My problem last night wasn't just the tech calls that I barely understand myself. I also had regular customer service calls that were just plain ridiculous. A pay-per-view call that I ended up having to transfer to my coach because of his "stories." A billing call where she was actually calling to accuse us of setting her up for failure. A man from Puerto Rico that had talk to rep after rep trying to get programming that is just not offered there (he kept me a half hour late after I had already stayed for an hour of overtime). The list goes on.

Sure there were the easy calls that were straight forward for regular customer service and tech calls that didn't last long and were solved quickly. I did have a call that took a while, but I felt good about it in the end. It is just that those were few and far between. We had back to back calls all night.

***Now the disclaimer that I have to add.***

My view do not reflect the opinion of Dish Network or its employees.

***Wasn't that fun?***