I was just curious if anyone has developed a scripted method for their own businesses to handle technical support/customer inquiry calls that never end. Every so often we will get a call from someone that just wants to talk and talk and talk about various things that really are not productive.

We always like to give people the time to explain their thoughts and to communicate with them, but when someone continues to call and use four hours of someones work day on what is essentially a waste of time, how have people handled this?

I'm sure technical support call centers have scripted methods to handle this, and I was curious if anyone else who runs a company has a methodology for handling this in an appropriate and professional manner.

Thanks for any thoughts,

Jeff

I used to do support calls for Microsoft in the good old days. Anyways, we had some of those people, especially in the early Saturday mornings.

Here's some advice:
Be pleasant but direct, and ask them if there is anything else you can do for them in relation to the game. If not, explain that you have to take care of other support issues.

Don't be sucked in by personal problems. Don't respond to by trying to sympathize with them. This just encourages them on.

Keep them on topic, and keep steering them back if they start talking about other things.

Good luck

I moved to the other side of the world and now people first have to figure out the time difference and then have to consider a rather expensive phone bill!

Hope that helps.

:)

Try "Somebody is at the door, anything else" (Have that doorbell sound handy on your computer somewhere).

One word: Caller ID!

I worked on a technical helpdesk for a year and it is indeed a very strange phenomenon. Some people just kept talking about the good olden days and bit this and that, and all they ever bought was a $10 mousepad or something (for which you had to go and order the specific color they wanted). I think the key is to distantiate yourself from the personal situation and never loose your sense of humor.

I sometimes felt that some people just came in to see how long they could keep you off work, as for 10 minutes sometimes all I could fit in was, uhhuh, hmmm, bu....

Clueless they are!

Good luck!