This is a place for readers’ comments or questions about the book, or about customer service in general. I promise to respond (in the order in which they are received, of course), and I encourage others to join in too. But please try to keep the conversation as civil and constructive as possible.
Thanks, Emily
1. Document all calls
Make note of the time you call, are put on hold, and finally get through. Write down everyone’s names, and ask how to spell them, to show you are paying attention. Make notes on all that is agreed. If you have to backtrack with supervisors, saying, “I called at 10:24 on Wednesday the 10th and spoke to Angela,” is stronger than, “I called sometime last week.”
2. Remember your call is a business transaction, not a personal relationship
Even though they are complete strangers, some customer service agents can make us more as angry than our closest friends and family. Remind yourself, and the agent, that you don’t know each other. Their insults and disrespect are not really about you. And your criticism or anger is about the company not that agent.
3. Encourage the agent to work with you (not against you) to solve your problem
This one is pretty Zen. And in some cases it may be impossible. But calls often start out with customers and agents on the defensive, because of unpleasant past experiences on both sides. Recognize that potential and don’t get blindsided by a particularly unhelpful agent. There are probably circumstances way beyond your control, or the agent’s, for that agent’s attitude. So work to get the agent on the same team as you, and maybe the company will follow. In the long run it is in the company’s best interest to resolve your issues to your satisfaction as quickly as possible.
4. Recognize your value as a customer, and use it, but don’t abuse it
Figure out how much you spend with the company each year — $100 a month is $1,200 a year. Don’t let the agent or supervisor disregard that worth. State your case unemotionally, and grounded in the facts. You spend money with this company. You are not getting paid to call them with this problem. In fact, you paid to be their customer. But the agent is getting paid to listen to and resolve your problem. Just remember, the agent might have to deal with one-hundred or more customers in a day. So try not to throw your weight around in a way that alienates the people charged with helping you.
5. Not all companies care as much about customer service as we might want
Some really backward companies still view customer service as merely an inescapable nuisance. Realize that most of the world is moving on from that retro view. You might not get better service, but you probably will be more likely to support companies with a cutting-edge customer service approach. Eventually laggards will be forced to catch up or fade away.
6. If all else fails, appeal to a higher power
Not a divine power necessarily, but when talking with agents and supervisors turns futile, take your story to the top executives — many in large corporations have people in their offices who deal with customer issues. Also, the internet has become an outlet for customer complaints. You can Twitter about the company or visit other consumer complaint sites that some companies monitor, such as Get Satisfaction or Consumerist. The internet can be the way out of a customer service dead end.
Burke's Bookstore is near Emily's home and can ship freshly signed books anywhere, if you contact them directly
Synopsis: If you would like an outstanding history of the maddening world of telephone customer service, please press 1. If you want stories of abysmal, appalling, and antagonistic encounters between irate customers and supercilious operators, please press 2. If you want to go inside these call centers, and meet the mild-mannered housewives and college kids who answer calls in marginal locations from Utah to Timbuktu, please press 3. If you want some idea of the ridiculous lengths some companies will go to place automated buffers between themselves and their customers, please press 4. If you want all of the above, please read this book by Emily Yellin, and all of your questions will be answered in the order in which they were received.
Description: There are probably very few of us who have been able to bypass the potentially infuriating trap of poor customer service. Be it through long lines, or insanely long hold times, the methods and madness of customer service today creep into all of our lives. In “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us” journalist Emily Yellin invites readers to follow her around the globe on a quest to discover the in’s and out’s of this global industry. The result is an astonishing chronicle that goes well beyond practical definition in its exploration of how and why this industry affects those in business and those in need of help.
Emily Yellin’s customer-friendly romp through this unfriendly world rings so true
Ms. Yellin is an illuminating guide whose conclusions are sound
Entertaining because Yellin is smart and funny throughout
Our picks for the best new business books
Yellin dives into the often dysfunctional world of customer service, exploring the multibillion-dollar industry from various points of view ...
If you would like an outstanding history of the maddening world of telephone customer service, please press 1. If you want stories of abysmal, appalling, and antagonistic encounters between irate customers and supercilious operators, please press 2. If you want to go inside these call centers, and meet the mild-mannered housewives and college kids who answer calls in marginal locations from Utah to Timbuktu, please press 3. If you want some idea of the ridiculous lengths some companies will go to place automated buffers between themselves and their customers, please press 4. If you want all of the above, please read this book by Emily Yellin, and all of your questions will be answered in the order in which they were received.
Q&A with Emily for the paperback release — August 2010
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Emily Yellin is the author of Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us (Free Press 2009) and Our Mothers’ War (Free Press 2004), and was a longtime contributor to The New York Times. She has also written for Time, The Washington Post, The International Herald Tribune, Newsweek, Smithsonian Magazine, and other publications.
Born in White Plains, New York, Emily grew up in Memphis. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Madison with a degree in English literature, and received a master’s degree in journalism from Northwestern University. She has lived in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, and London, but currently lives in Memphis.
Emily decided to write Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us while waiting on hold one day in her freezing cold house, only to argue on the phone for hours with customer service at a home warranty company before convincing someone to come fix her broken furnace.
For book publicity information or interviews:
Meagan Brown
Free Press
Simon & Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
212-632-4948
meagan.brown@simonandschuster.com
For speaking inquiries:
Les Tuerk
BrightSight Group
268 Wall Street
Princeton, NJ 08540
609-924-3060
les@brightsightgroup.com
To contact Emily directly:
or
The Wall Street Journal — Book Review
Please, Stay on the Line — A tour through the maddening world of customer service. — By Barbara D. Phillips … In “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us,” Emily Yellin strives to “seek out the humanity and reason behind the customer service experiences that many people find to be inhuman and nonsensical.”
Ms. Yellin, a Memphis-based journalist, mixes polls and studies with excerpts from published reports and her own insightful reporting from call centers and related businesses in the U.S. and overseas. read more …
“When we call, what we want is ‘yes,’ that’s it,” said Emily Yellin, the author of “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us,” a revealing look at customer service in the United States. read and watch more …
U.S. Airways Magazine — Must Read
Customer service can make or break a business’s reputation. Excerpt of first chapter of the book. read more …
Talk of the Nation — National Public Radio
Frustrating customer service stories are commonplace. For her book Your Call Is (Not That) Important To Us, Emily Yellin looked into the history and future of customer service. She spoke with people at every link of the customer service chain. And she thinks it’s possible things will improve. Host Neal Conan talks to Emily Yellin and they take listener calls. listen to more…
Here & Now — Public Radio International
Please Hold. Your Call Is (Not That) Important To Us: We make 43 billion customer service calls a year and despite outsourcing, it’s a growing industry in the U.S. Businesses are realizing they need to get customer service right, and they are turning to scientists working in artificial intelligence and psychology to devise better systems, both human and automated. We speak with journalist Emily Yellin, author of, “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us.” listen to more…
The Conversation with Ross Reynolds — KUOW-FM Seattle
If You’d Like To Hear A Segment On Customer Service, Please Press One – Emily Yellin joins us to talk about the ever changing world of customer service. We also take listener calls. listen to more …
Miami Herald — You Can Get Most Anything at a Kiosk
By Bridget Carey – Check in at the doctor’s, rent DVDs, buy swimsuits at the latest self-service machines… Emily Yellin, author of customer service book Your Call is (Not That) Important to Us, hasn’t been a big fan of kiosks since a kiosk malfunctioned when she tried to get movie tickets in New York. read more…
by Matthew Phillips – After death, taxes and inclement weather, it’s one of life’s most inescapable downers: the customer-service call. Getting help can be an automated hell, an eternity of Muzak, code punching and security questions. Which is why the title of Emily Yellin’s customer-friendly romp through this unfriendly world rings so true: “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us.” read more …
NEW YORK (Fortune) — Most Americans dread calling customer service, and it’s easy to see why. Whether it’s the seemingly endless “press 1 now” steps, android representatives, or long waits, it can seem like companies just don’t care.
So why has this multibillion-dollar industry gotten so bad, and will it ever get better? Emily Yellin tackles the question in her new book … read more …
U.S. News & World Report — Alpha Consumer — Q & A
by Kimberly Palmer – Why Customer Service Has Gotten So Bad – Wondering why you have to wait on hold for an hour each time your credit card company makes a mistake? Or why the cable company demands that you sit at home for three hours and wait for its representative to show up? Journalist Emily Yellin’s new book, Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us: Customer Service and What It Reveals About Our World and Our Lives, answers those questions and more. She takes on the customer service industry, and explains why it makes so many of us miserable. read more …
Listen to the U.S. News & World Report Alpha Consumer podcast …
Customer service is a two-way street: Remain calm to get what you want — by Jean Chatsky — Before picking up the phone to deal with a pesky customer service issue, make an outline for yourself in order to help stay calm…. read more …
Customer disservice – Frustrated consumers can vent on Internet, so poor responses can sink company reputations. By Stephanie Hoops If you’ve ever been asked to hold for an operator only to be left waiting until your ear grows numb, Emily Yellin feels your pain — so much so that she wrote a book about it. read more …
New York City Public Radio — The Brian Lehrer Show — WNYC
Americans make more than 43 billion customer service calls each year. To find out what’s really going on at the other end of the line, Emily Yellin, author of the new book, Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us, traveled the world to investigate the multi-billion dollar customer service industry. hear the segment …
Blake Landau interviews Emily Yellin, whose new book is a modern, humorous and engaging account of the customer service industry today. In this interview, Yellin gives surprising and counterintuitive insights into her in-the-trenches customer service research. Yellin gives a fair account of customer service and contact center issues. She has interviewed hundreds of people at corporations, call center representatives, customers and everyone in between. hear the podcast …
Your Call Is (Not That) Important – What Lousy Customer Service Reveals About Our World – When you call for customer care, do you ever feel like your call is not that important to the representative helping you?
If so, you’re not alone. Every year, more than 43 billion calls are made to customer service representatives, yet companies still haven’t learned the value of good customer service.
Journalist Emily Yellin explores the inner workings of this multi-billion-dollar industry in her book: “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us: Customer Service and What It Reveals About Our World and Our Lives.” hear the segment …
Brent Leary’s CRM blog and podcast
… In the immortal words of Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five – “Don’t push me cuz I’m close to the edge, I’m trying not to lose my head…”. There are too many ways for us as customers to show our discontent that go way beyond just not spending our hard-earned dollars…. Emily Yellin and I recently had a fun conversation about her book. She shares some insights she gained from conversations with folks like Fedex CEO Fred Smith and Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh. She also talks about the Customer Rage study, and the things that surprised her as she traveled throughout the world visiting call centers in places like Egypt and Argentina. listen to the podcast …
Call Waiting – Can business and customers find common ground? by Leonard Gill – Fed up with customer service by phone? God knows you’ve got your reasons: the wait, the runaround, that voice from halfway around the world…. [Customer service is] according to Emily Yellin, a barometer of how we communicate and how we treat each other not only nationally but globally and across all sorts of barriers. ”Race, gender, class, nationality … customer service is a crossroads of contemporary culture,” Yellin said. “From people on welfare to Nordstrom shoppers, it’s an amazing way to look at the world.” read more …
A journalist, she was taking notes, keeping track of each exasperating conversation and the names of each person who stood between her and warmth. Suddenly her frustrations crystallized: “‘Somebody ought to look into this, and I could be the one to do it.’ “ read more …
The Afternoon Magazine with Celeste Quinn — Champaign-Urbana Public Radio
Celeste Quinn interviews Emily Yellin and they take listeners calls. hear the show …
New Hampshire Public Radio — Word of Mouth
By Virgina Prescott – Calling customer service often feels like you’re in a one way relationship. It’s time to face it: your call center’s just not that into you. hear the segment …
KMOX St. Louis The Mark Reardon Show
Customer service is important to most every person whether it be the customer or the employer. Mark talks about that and more with Emily Yellin, author of “Your Call is (not that) Important to Us.” hear the segment …
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Book Review
Emily Yellin’s book begins in a similarly satisfying way when she describes a real-life customer’s infuriating search for service at a “communications” company. The customer, 76, turns into a folk hero by applying a hammer to a Comcast rep’s keyboard. read more …
Emily Yellin tells how calling customer service is a disservice in her book YOUR CALL IS (not that) IMPORTANT TO US, an examination of a huge, aggravating industry. We ask, “Is there hope or will we be on hold forever? hear the podcast …
Washington Post Book World podcast — Ron Charles interviews Emily Yellin
Tampa Tribune — 2 Months After J.D. Power Honor, Regulators Stepped In At WellCare
By Richard Mullins — Tampa
…”Some skepticism by consumers is a healthy thing here,” said Emily Yellin , author of “Your Call is Not That Important To Us,” which is about call centers. Ratings companies may interview thousands of customers of a service provider, but “it’s all about how you phrase the question.” read more …
Reuters: Business Books: Customer service, from both ends of the phone
By Lisa Von Ahn — New York — There’s no question that “customer care representatives” are the people U.S. customers love to hate, but the feeling is often mutual. Consumers gripe about the confusing phone prompts, lengthy hold times and ill-prepared employees that are often the hallmarks of a call to a company — and many have no compunction about taking their frustration out on those at the other end of the phone.
Emily Yellin, author of an upcoming book with the tongue-in-cheek title “Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us,” sees room for improvement on both sides. read more …
Why does everyone hate calling customer service and who is to blame for it being so bad?
There’s a long answer and a short answer to that question. The long answer is my book.
The somewhat shorter answer is that in the past 30 years or so, as customer service has become a mostly
telephone-based industry, companies have tried to find the cheapest, most efficient ways of doing it. Part of
the result is the long hold times we all hate, as well as being passed around from person to person or
country to country within a company, and automated agents that make it hard for you even to talk to a real
human being. Still, while companies have achieved their corporate goals of saving money, they have not
paid much attention to the long-term effects of all that dehumanizing, time-wasting treatment on the
psyches of the people who make the calls (customers), and the people who handle the calls for companies
(agents). But the long-term is now, and the corporate world is just beginning to acknowledge the price of
their customer service missteps so far.
As for who is to blame, after all my research, interviews, travels and writing, I firmly believe that most of
the blame lies at the very top of the corporate ladder. I met many people who work in customer service who
would like to do it differently. They know they aren’t giving their customers the best care possible. But they
aren’t respected for their role in their companies, and therefore aren’t given the support and resources they
need to do it right. The way that companies treat the customer service function and customer service
workers is the way they treat their customers. So until the customer service function in the company is
valued and not handled as an afterthought, and until the customer service workers have more status within
their companies, the problems will continue.
Which companies have you found have the best and worst customer service?
That is a common question I get. No one company is 100 percent perfect at it. But there are some
companies that are touted for getting it more right than wrong. Zappos, Apple, FedEx and UPS, Amazon,
and Starbucks are among those who get more praise than complaints. But they get their share of naysayers
too.
Generally, internet retailers and overnight shipping have some of the highest scores in annual customer
satisfaction surveys. Cable and satellite TV and cell phone companies generally receive the lowest scores,
along with the airlines. One company I talk a lot about in the book is Comcast. They are actually working
hard to improve their dismal reputation for customer service. And while they are not there yet, their story is
an interesting illustration of how to change things in a big company like that. Social networking has played
a role in that, since they had some early very notorious PR disasters that became famous on YouTube and
other parts of the web.
What steps can companies take to ensure better customer service?
Most companies need to pay a lot more attention to the entire experience their customers have.
Customer service departments evolved from the role of the receptionist. As toll-free phone numbers
became the norm among companies in the 1980s, and as desktop computers became business staples
around that same time, companies suddenly were forced to provide their customers with a place to call and
people to answer the phones. More often than not, that meant that customer service workers were just seen
as glorified receptionists. They had very little authority to change things in companies, even though they
were often the first to hear of problems. And they were not thought of as marketers, even though they were
often the only people inside companies that customers ever encountered.
Thankfully, there is now a trend among most forward-looking companies to pay attention to the entire
interaction a customer has with a company. In business jargon, that is called the customer experience — a
very important new concept for making our lives better as customers. Paying attention to the customer
experience means that companies are beginning to see the trajectory of and connections among all the ways
we as customers come into contact with them, from advertising and marketing, to product development and
sales, to customer service. And companies are beginning to look at it all from the customer’s perspective
first, instead of from their own perspective first. So they see customer service as a thread that runs through
all they do, that drives all their decisions, instead of as a necessary evil that is tacked on to the end of their
business after they’ve made a sale. Time and again, the companies that have embraced that kind of thinking
about their customers, seeing their relationships with customers as long-term and acting accordingly, are
the companies that have endured and weathered all storms in the marketplace, including the recent
recession.
How has the internet, particularly social media, changed the way businesses handle their customer
service?
The internet has been one of the most important tools customers have ever had in standing up to companies
that have treated them wrong. Social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook and Yelp have
fundamentally changed the way that companies deal with their customers. I see it as mostly a good
influence. Companies can’t hide bad policies, products or treatment of customers behind customer service
firewalls as easily anymore. Customers have more power to join together. They are not as isolated from
each other in dealing with companies and so can see when they are not the only ones who have had
problems. It really is a revolution that I think will make it harder for companies to get away with some of
what we all have come to hate in customer service. But it will take time.
Also, I think that businesses are just starting to see the amazing intelligence they can gather if they would
just listen to their customers more closely and more seriously. The customer service department is a
company’s built-in conduit for that. And social networking allows them to do it in real time, where before
they had to spend tons of money on expensive and not-always-reliable focus groups, or other sorts of
annoying surveys. I don’t think social networking will replace that. But again, I think it is forcing all
listening by companies to become more customer-friendly.
Are you optimistic or pessimistic about customer service improving?
Since doing the book, I am more optimistic than I was when I started. And I tried to show some hope in the
book, since people are so bitter about their bad encounters with customer service. Everyone has a story to
tell about their most recent or most horrible customer service encounter. I want my book to help people see
that things can be better, and that we as customers need to ask for more and expect more. But again, I think
the main thing that has to happen for real improvement in customer service is that companies have to
elevate the role of customer service in their corporate hierarchies and value its amazing ability to contribute
more to the bottom line as well as to the general tone of how we treat each other in public. That is a tall
order. I can’t say I am entirely sure it will happen. But I am convinced that it is the only way the lasting
change needed will be possible.
For speaking inquiries:
Les Tuerk
BrightSight Group
268 Wall Street
Princeton, NJ 08540
609-924-3060
les@brightsightgroup.com
Day 1 Keynoter: How you say it as important as what you say — Emily Yellin
By Kathleen Savino – Aug 2, 2010 – NEW YORK (SpeechTEK) — Kicking off this year’s conference, Emily Yellin gave a rousing speech based on her new book Your Call is Not That Important To Us. Yellin, a journalist, gave a well-attended talk that was a call to arms for companies to amend bad business practices, such as one she says initially inspired the book’s concept. She was on hold for hours for her home warranty company that was supposed to fix her furnace. It was then, that she realized that someone needed to look into these kinds of practices. “I try to do my reporting from the customer’s perspective,” she said. read more…
CRM Evolution 2010 Opens with a Bit of Yellin
NEW YORK, August 2, 2010 — At the kickoff of this year’s CRM Evolution conference here, opening keynote presenter Emily Yellin shared a series of observations about the potential pitfalls in customer service. Rather than rattle off a series of CRM’s Greatest Hits to an audience of CRM (and CRM trade show) veterans, Yellin (@eyellin on Twitter) painted the picture with anecdotes from her personal experience. read more…
