Customer Service - How to Lose Customers and Alienate Clients

When customers have a problem, don’t fix it!

When those annoying people known as clients call with issues, let the phone ring at least five times before you answer. Eventually, when you do pick up, ask the client to hold for a moment and then proceed to put the call on hold for another couple of minutes as you finish your cup of coffee and attempt an entry in the Sudoku puzzle. By this time the customer should have gotten impatient and probably hung up. If they haven’t, lift the receiver and casually ask,

“mmh, how may I help you?”

At this point the person will probably proceed to vent their anger for being kept on hold for so long or they may just choose to ignore your actions and proceed to explain why they have called. Either way, feign a poor connection and pretend not to hear them, sort of like you have seen it done in some TV comedy,

“hello, hello, are you still there, speak louder, hello hello... you are breaking up...” You get the drift.

Promptly hang up and keep the phone off the hook for a couple of minutes to give you time to finish your Sudoku.

If the annoyance decides to pay you a visit personally, do your utmost best to make them feel idiotic. For example, if you sold the person a PC and they claim that the keyboard does not work, ask in as condescending a tone as you can possibly manage,

“did you bother to plug it in?”

Or my personal favorite,

“did you even bother to switch on the machine?”

That should make them feel fairly insulted and indignant. Hopefully, they shall leave your premises in a huff and you will never see nor hear from them again.