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Moving
Having just gone through four different phone systems to move my bank and credit cards, I had the following experiences:
Barclays Bank:
I called the Barclaycard number by mistake. It asked me to enter my card number, noticed it was a debit not credit card and re-routed my call. Good! Where I then had to enter my 16 digit number again. Annoying! (but predictable, and my initial mistake).
Spoke to a scouser who asked me tonnes of authentication questions, then was asked a 5-digit phone-banking PIN which I've never set or requested, so didn't know.
Result: Have to go to a branch in person with my passport. FAIL. Plus, the Scouser will surely rob me now.
Barclaycard:
Robot guided me through the authentication process, then I spoke to an Indian guy via a crappy line. He didn't recognise my data very well, but repeated and confirmed at the appropriate times, got the job done, then asked in the most wonderfully disinterested tone if he'd done all I wanted and ended the call.
Result: Success! I don't mind if the phone manner's crap or where they happen to be outsourced to if they can do their job without too many repeats.
Egg Card:
EXCITING! A robot asked me for ALL VERBAL information, which I seemed to get through completely fine! Because I wanted to do something off-menu, after authenticating, it passed me to a human in an English call centre...
... who apologised and asked me to go through the whole authentication process again as there had been a hiccup between the mega-brain and his computer. *groan*
Which also started to update itself (read: was becoming self-aware) mid-call, and caused a 2-minute pause in which the guy didn't bother to say "sorry, we're still waiting", so I was forced to check if he was still there.
Eventually, we got it all done, though, and his phone manner improved as he noticed an oddity of my post-code and we shared a crap joke.
Result: Success! But my hopes of doing business with Wintermute were dashed.
MINT Card:
Badly voiced female robot (interspersed with amusingly different female robot doing the number-entry / confirmation) asked me to please ENTER my PASS-word NOW. THANKyou...
Eventually get through to another English call-centre, where a guy gets me through the process in a minimal of hassle.
Result: BORING. OK, boring success.
Overall result: 3/4
* The least exciting and least customer-friendly-feeling service made no mistakes and did the job quickest.
* Robots still don't rule the world via wires into our minds.
* I still have to go into a fucking bank to move my address, even though three questions a chimp could guess were sufficient to re-instate my card last time they erroneously blocked it because I bought pizza on the internets.
Banks: Still not very impressive, are they?
Barclays Bank:
I called the Barclaycard number by mistake. It asked me to enter my card number, noticed it was a debit not credit card and re-routed my call. Good! Where I then had to enter my 16 digit number again. Annoying! (but predictable, and my initial mistake).
Spoke to a scouser who asked me tonnes of authentication questions, then was asked a 5-digit phone-banking PIN which I've never set or requested, so didn't know.
Result: Have to go to a branch in person with my passport. FAIL. Plus, the Scouser will surely rob me now.
Barclaycard:
Robot guided me through the authentication process, then I spoke to an Indian guy via a crappy line. He didn't recognise my data very well, but repeated and confirmed at the appropriate times, got the job done, then asked in the most wonderfully disinterested tone if he'd done all I wanted and ended the call.
Result: Success! I don't mind if the phone manner's crap or where they happen to be outsourced to if they can do their job without too many repeats.
Egg Card:
EXCITING! A robot asked me for ALL VERBAL information, which I seemed to get through completely fine! Because I wanted to do something off-menu, after authenticating, it passed me to a human in an English call centre...
... who apologised and asked me to go through the whole authentication process again as there had been a hiccup between the mega-brain and his computer. *groan*
Which also started to update itself (read: was becoming self-aware) mid-call, and caused a 2-minute pause in which the guy didn't bother to say "sorry, we're still waiting", so I was forced to check if he was still there.
Eventually, we got it all done, though, and his phone manner improved as he noticed an oddity of my post-code and we shared a crap joke.
Result: Success! But my hopes of doing business with Wintermute were dashed.
MINT Card:
Badly voiced female robot (interspersed with amusingly different female robot doing the number-entry / confirmation) asked me to please ENTER my PASS-word NOW. THANKyou...
Eventually get through to another English call-centre, where a guy gets me through the process in a minimal of hassle.
Result: BORING. OK, boring success.
Overall result: 3/4
* The least exciting and least customer-friendly-feeling service made no mistakes and did the job quickest.
* Robots still don't rule the world via wires into our minds.
* I still have to go into a fucking bank to move my address, even though three questions a chimp could guess were sufficient to re-instate my card last time they erroneously blocked it because I bought pizza on the internets.
Banks: Still not very impressive, are they?
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Have you seen the prices in London pubs recently? THAT'S robbery. You southern shandy drinking ponce ;)
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