r/callcentres

Hi all,

I've been working from home as a tech support agent for quite some time now.

These past couple of weeks have been quite rough with the increase in call volume and strict metrics that have been implemented. I've found myself increasingly drinking more alcohol as a result of the stress and burnout from this environment. I'm at the point where I'm even smoking cigarettes often, something that I had quit over a decade ago.

Waking up in the morning is extremely difficult, just getting out of bed and thinking about work is mental torture of the highest order. I've essentially used all my PTO due to clocking in late most mornings because of how exhausting it is. There are times where I am off work and hear phantom ringing sounds out of nowhere.

Additionally, my libido is almost non existent which is probably related to the burnout. I'm in my early 30s and feel like an elderly man with little to no energy.

What are some other negative physiological effects on the body that can stem from this line of work?

I'm considering taking FMLA for a second time, however, I'm not doing well financially and taking time off work for an extended period of time would seriously take a toll on my bills. The current job market is abysmal and I've had no luck in finding something better.

I live on my own and have parents that could support me temporarily, but I do not want to be a burden to them. My health is deteriorating both mentally and physically. I remember the first time I took time off work earlier this year I felt amazing. My sleep was restorative and had no symptoms in relation to stress.

Yet when I call most companies for help with something there is an automatic message saying we will not tolerate any abusive language, its almost as if my company thinks it is not an issue but it is, my place gets a fair share of irate customers who can snap if something goes wrong like an appointment being cancelled which happens daily. Does your workplace have an automated message advising of this? If not and you have an uptick abusive calls there may be reason for it and people can then assume they can be abusive as our automated system did not advise them not to be

Does your job treat your one call off in months as the end of the world? I had two when I started cause I had the flu. One last week cause my stomach was funky, and I went in and volunteered yesterday to work and my boss was a dick and gave me the side eye.

Anybody else go through this?

When I have gotten callers from Hawaii and they ask where I am at, I like saying the United States and love to hear the reaction. If I’m talking to someone in Alaska and it’s summertime. I like to ask how’s the snow?

The Job had been out for 10 months almost, and is still out!!!!! So I don't get the logic behind rejecting my applications lol, I had retail experience of 2 years and waitressing/hospitality experience of 3 years along with general Technical Knowledge. My friend who applied also got rejected. The vacancy is still out and it's mind boggling, this was for a utility company by the way.

Needless to say, I am very happy I never got accepted anyways, even though I desperately needed the job, I'm back to working in hospitality now and even though hospitality is brutal, I grin after reading some of the posts on this Sub happy that I never have to endure anything you guys are going through.

Oh yeah I only joined this sub because I was applying to the call centre job AARGH. hang in there y'all things will get better.

I’ve realized that reading yalls experiences has made me feel less alone in this horrible job that I’m stuck in rn. Anyone know if there is a discord for us to all chat together to vent and talk about our jobs?

Boomer from Texas comes on and refuses to verify his full birth date. I ask for another form of verification and he immediately gets nasty and starts cursing. I give him his first warning and he gets even angrier and starts yelling louder.

I ended the call. I am NOT dealing with those type of people today. When they can grow a brain and lose the attitude, I will help. Maybe he needed his damned diaper change. IDK but I am OVER IT.

Hi there Reddit - I've never posted before but I just felt the need to rant and get it off my chest I guess.

I can't do this job anymore, everyday I wake up with sinking dread. I've stopped eating properly, I can barely sleep. I'm always so anxious and it's just broken me down mentally. At the start of my two years here, I could take it all as water off a ducks back, now when someone yells I physically shake - I'm constantly waiting for the next QA result or being pulled into a meeting / being pulled up for something.

I guess there's not really a point to this, I just wanted to get it out in the open that this job has destroyed my mental health, and I would warn anyone off Contact Centre work if I could.

I had a caller trying to handle their leasing agreement by today, because their due date is the 5th. Why would you wait until the day before the holiday weekend to get that sorted? Clearly your housing wasn't a priority if you waited until the last minuet.

It's saturday here and I'm at work. I like it because of the low chat volume (I'm a chat admin), less people, and we can dress how we like, but today I feel so discreminated. They removed the tissue paper rolls from almost every toilet. I had to take a trip to every floor I'm allowed to enter just to find one toilet at the 3rd floor with a tissue paper roll (wich was about to run out). All the surrounding shops are closed, even one in the building so I couldn't buy a tissue paper roll. I'm glad they didn't turn off our water supply too. Just because there are less people than monday-friday doesn't mean there's nobody. We've been treated as if we're not humans enough by our customers

Just venting

Update: made it to the 3rd floor just to find out they fucking took the last roll.

I've noticed with remote work that some not all coworkers and managers will do this. I had a manager go over a new process with me and wanted me to repeat the steps to her. I have a good memory so I repeated what she said verbatim with no issue. Her response with an annoyed tone "okay so all that proves is that you can regurgitate information..." I stopped the meeting and got my union rep involved immediately because all she did was ask me to repeat the steps which is exactly what I did . I just know that if we were face to face having that discussion she would have phrased whatever she was trying to say in a more professional manner.

Then I had a coworker on my team that I discovered liked calling everyone no matter what gender "gurrrl". I am not a "gurrrl" and I had to ask him twice to stop before I got management involved. I feel like that's something he wouldn't have repeatedly called me in person and I also feel he would have stopped after the first time I asked so I wouldn't have to get management involved. Any other fully remote people experience coworkers and managers getting too comfortable like this?

Any time the call que hits zero, they send 3-4 people home. Then the numbers jump into the 20's and higher and stay for the rest of the shift. I talked so much in 1 hour, my face/jaws began to hurt!! After hour 2, my voice started going out! I don't talk much outside of work. If this keeps up, I'm going to literally have to go mute when I'm NOT clocked in. I need to learn sign language to communicate off the clock. I'm complete serious.

It would be easier to do this than to try and find another job in my situation and in this economy. What a pathetic life I have if this is what I have to do just to make ends meet.....

I review bank chargebacks, which is essentially internet court. Basically, customers tell us what went wrong with their money, we tell whoever has the money to give it back, and depending on what they say, we approve/deny the chargeback or ask them to pay up one more time and hope it happens. It’s not a particularly fast or easy process for many reasons, and every day you’re working 100+ cases while taking calls from customers who are upset by default. Not sure how it is at other banks.

Anyways, I'm normally fairly good at talking to said customers, but this time someone calls because their chargeback was denied. A newer coworker who spoke to them before is calmly re-explaining their decision, but they aren’t listening and ask to be transferred to someone higher up. I happen to be one of the “higher-ups” in question as we’re supposed to avoid getting a supervisor when possible.

I read their documents and immediately see the problem: customer claims a ~$60 charge is fraud, but the merchant has an invoice showing a purchase for a winter coat. Made in January. They’re in Alaska and it was ordered to their address from a trusted device. All reasonable grounds for denial, so I get the customer (who is eager to tell me how unhelpful and apathetic the coworker was) on the phone and start to briefly recap. Before I can ask if their device was compromised, etc., and offer some possible solutions, they insist the charge is fraud and that the coworker is stupid. I ask for a hold to decide whether it’s worth it to keep pushing the case.

Now, I usually couldn’t care less about something as simple as being called stupid; we've all heard 10× worse and it wasn’t even directed at me. But what got me is that the coworker did perfectly acceptable work by the bank’s standards and risked getting thrown under the bus by their trigger-happy supervisor had they approved the chargeback (I know because I once had that supervisor). I muttered, “Why don’t you go herd some cows… whatever, we could probably still win on a good day,” before returning to the call to say the latter part in some more professional terms. Aaand I missed the hold button.

The customer is understandably angry, and I am sorry they had to hear me say that—then they started to insult my appearance (they can see my email icon) and say we don’t deserve our jobs, to which I became slightly less sorry. I was so dumbfounded I even let that happen that I could barely do anything but try to move the call on, and of course tell management immediately after so things didn’t get worse. I’ve never done anything like that and can’t believe it was over something so small. I guess the moral of the story is that if you’ve put your foot in your mouth at work, you’re not alone…

In the beginning of working in this shitty place I tried hard, but have realized that no matter what I do the result is the same, there is always something keeping me from making comission, also I fucking hate this job, so I’m done.

I have stopped trying, I don’t care. At first they reached out to me and asked what was wrong, that I had to try harder, etc. first I even thought about trying but it’s so draining, I’m prioritizing my mental health and doing the bare minimum.

For months now I’ve been actively not giving a fuck. I barely try to convince clients not to cancel, all my calls last from 2-3min. If a client starts yelling at me I either yell back or I hang up. In my last performance meeting my team lead sounded done with me lol. Somehow they haven’t fired me yet, the day they do I will throw a party.

4 years of this and Its still infuriating.

"you set my due date to the wrong date"

No, YOU told us you wanted to pay on the last working day

"but I dont get paid until the 10th"

Then maybe should have told us that?? And how does that change anything, youre just paying later in your pay cycle???? Youre not paying twice a month??

Today i got written up for attendance technically i have 3 occurances, the policy allows 6 before you got terminated. realistically how long do i have before then can me so i can be prepared ?🥲

We have an all hands on deck this early morning😭.

It's too early for this, i might just leave early.

We were supposed to have a team meeting with operations in a bit and now it's cancelled.

Hi everyone. I just wanted to ask for some advice regarding my application at CONCENTRIX.

I had my validation interview today, and I was able to join the meeting and briefly speak with the interviewer. Unfortunately, our call got disconnected because of a network issue, and I couldn’t reconnect.

At the time, I was already on my way home, and the traffic was so heavy that I got off the public transport to find a quieter place for the interview. I first went to a convenience store, but it was too noisy, so I transferred to a nearby mall. Sadly, the signal there was unstable, which caused the call to disconnect.

I immediately emailed the recruitment team, explained what happened, attached screenshots as proof that I attended, and requested another interview.

Do you think I still have a chance of getting hired or being given another opportunity? Has anyone experienced something similar with Concentrix and still got rescheduled? I really need this job, so I’m feeling anxious right now.

I‘d really appreciate any advice or experiences. Thank you so much. 🙏

Just had a call. This lady wanted to see a OUR Rhuematologist, so they called this morning and was told they don’t have availble before Nov and asked ME (The Operator) if I could do anything.

I tell her, she can talk with our Rheumatology office and she relays the same thing she just told me and that she has a referral from the ER/Hospital.

I tell her again, Rheumatology handles scheduling and that if they were already told they wouldn’t have scheduling until later in the year, I would not be able to change that, but I could transfer them over if anything had changed.

I’m sorry but like, schedules don’t change within hours for 1 and for two, I heard what you said the first time, I don’t need it rehashed like that’s going to change my answer. I offered a solution, after that you’re just annoying.

This is mostly a rant more than anything but the concept of getting off a 20-30 minute call that was immensely emotionally draining , just to see there’s another call or calls waiting in the queue and you’re expected to just be ready to become a telephonic punching bag to whoever is on the other end of that line is diabolical .

Personal time and ACW times should be extended to allow the agents to regulate themselves . And then they wonder why turn around is so high and why “nobody wants to work anymore” . Because you’ve created a toxic environment where you micromanage your agents in irrational ways. Make sure your handle is not too long, but also not too short. Make sure your ACW time is low. Make sure your miss calls are low. Don’t be rude or condescending to callers . Have empathy. Be understanding . Be patient .

All these expectations and no regard for the agents mental toll . They care so much about the customer having the best experience they can possibly have but could care less what experience the agent has as long as they meet their QA metrics .

I would be willing to bet call center agents have some of the highest forms of anxiety and depression if they were measured .