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From consumerist:

“A tech support supervisor, from what we figure to be Apple, has stepped forward to break down some behind-the-scenes workings with his underlings who sometimes make both his and consumer’s lives difficult. For instance, one of the reasons you might be on hold so long is agents using fake work codes to avoid taking calls. Also, we know that metrics rule the call centers, but, in one of the confessions, he talks about how not only is it important to not go over your average handle time, you also can’t go too far under. Just strive to be perfectly average, and you’ll go far…

“I am a tech support supervisor for a very well known computer company. (If you must know, this company is notoriously secretive. I think that’s a big enough clue.) I felt the need to respond to the “7 Confessions Of A Verizon DSL Tech Support Rep” article you ran with some insights of my own.

I also started near the beginning of a new call center that was supporting three different product lines for said computer company. Customer service was stressed over and over and over again. I’ve been with the call center for about 5 months, but I’ve worked in other non-call center positions with the company since 2002. I thought someone needed to shed light on the fact that the seven confessions are not the exception to the rule — they ARE the rule in most cases when it comes to tech support call centers.

This particular call center is all “Tier” (or Level) one support. Within this center, we have Quality Assurance to monitor the agent calls in-house. If necessary, these Tier 1 agents escalate difficult calls to Tier 2 — which can be anywhere in the world. It will almost never be the same person twice.

You’re not going to speak to someone’s actual supervisor
There is a specific, direct queue line to “Supervisor Requests” for our agents. I don’t know why most people think they will actually speak to the support agent’s actual supervisor. We’re too…”

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