Top Ten Telephone Etiquette Don'ts for Work from Home Call Center Agents

As a follow up to my article Top Ten Telephone Etiquette Do's for Work-from-Home Call Center Agents, here are the top ten don'ts you should follow to ensure you provide superior customer service while adhering to the rules of telephone etiquette.

1. Don't interrupt callers when they're speaking. One of the worst things you can do when taking calls is to interrupt or talk over customers. It's imperative that you communicate effectively with customers in order to provide the best service. The first step to good communication is listening to customers and understanding their requests or problems. Give them all the time they need to fully explain their situations or vent their frustrations. Listening makes customers feel important and feel like you care about them.

2. Don't sound bored or indifferent to callers' requests or questions. Sometimes working as a virtual call center agent can get monotonous, but you should never let customers know you feel that way. Each call should be treated like it's your first call of the day. You should constantly convey a sense of enthusiasm and caring toward your callers. By allowing yourself to sound bored during conversations with customers, you're immediately setting those calls up for failure.

3. Don't bring your emotions from a previous call into your current call. Again, approach each call as if it were your first call of the day. No callers should have the quality of their service adversely affected because of a negative call you just completed. As the phone rings after a difficult call, take a deep breath and tell yourself that just because your last call went poorly doesn't mean this one will, too. Then get ready to provide the best service you can.

4. Don't let callers' negative or angry tones affect you. As a virtual call center agent, you are at a disadvantage because you cannot see your customers. You don't know what is happening around them. They could be stuck in traffic or trying to tend to their children while speaking with you. In fact, you could be the second or third agent they've spoken to after being transferred several times. Bottomline, you don't know what baggage and distractions they're bringing into the call. Your job is to ignore those factors and treat customers with respect and care regardless of their potentially terse tone. Of course, that doesn't mean you need to be verbally abused, and undoubtedly, the company you're working for will have guidelines for you to follow in those extreme situations. However, during normal calls when customers speak to you with tones you don't like, take the opportunity to bring in your A game and bump up your level of customer service to the peak of your ability. Working with customers with the goal of providing such good service they'll have to smile is often the best way to approach negative customers. Sometimes you'll even succeed, and they're demeanor will change before they hang up the phone. Then you can pat yourself on the back knowing you performed your job well, and get ready for the next call.

5. Don't speak too quickly. When you're speaking through a telephone headset, your voice can be muffled and difficult to understand. Additionally, you aren't always aware of callers' education levels or familiarity with the English language (or the language you're using when taking calls). It is imperative that you are conscious of the rate of your speech and prepared to adjust according to your callers' cues. Are they asking you to repeat yourself? That's a good sign you need to slow down.

6. Don't eat, drink or chew gum while you're speaking with customers. It's bad enough that telephone headsets muffle your voice, but speaking to callers while you're eating, drinking or chewing gum makes your words unintelligible. Not only is it difficult for customers to understand you, but the sound of chewing and drinking is amplified when you're talking on the phone. While you may think you're chewing quietly, to your customers it may sound very different.

7. Don't cough, sneeze or clear your throat directly into the mouthpiece of your headset. If you need to sneeze or cough, move the mouthpiece away from your mouth and cover it with your hand. An even better option to successfully hide your audible ailments is to put your telephone on mute during a coughing or sneezing attack. Sneezing and coughing sounds ten times louder to your customers when the sounds are transmitted directly into their ears.

8. Don't breathe loudly into the mouthpiece of your headset. Pay attention to your breathing pattern when you're speaking with customers. Your breathing is amplified in the mouthpiece of your headset, and you don't want to sound like a prank caller to your customer.

9. Don't make up information when you don't know the answers to callers' questions in order to log those calls and end them. Recognize when a question or problem is beyond your ability to handle and find the appropriate person to accept a transfer from you. Providing misinformation can have detrimental effects to customers. Don't let your ego get in the way of providing great customer service every time you pick up the phone.

10. Don't forget your manners. Remember to say please and thank you. These words go a long way to showing the customer you respect them and value their business.