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your boss? Do you and your co-workers huddle around the break room and sing your boss's praises, or do you think your boss is some far less funny version of Bill Lumberg from Office Space who wouldn't know his head from his ass and most certainly couldn't step in and do your job competently in your absence? Right, it's probably the latter. Hell, half the reason I took this job at Cracked is because it's literally the first time I've had a boss who I trust to be better at my job than I am (remember this sentence come Christmas bonus time, Jack).



Please, not again.

Customer service reps feel the same way about their bosses as you do about yours, and they're usually right. Whatever you're calling about, that customer service rep has probably dealt with the exact same problem on dozens of other phone calls. Meanwhile, their supervisor sits in a cubicle and monitors how much downtime each employee takes between calls so they can justify giving them a 2 percent raise instead of a 3 percent raise, thereby ensuring the department they're in charge of comes in under budget for the year. Even if they got that job by being the very best customer service rep in all the land, their days of actually taking phone calls regularly have long since passed. By not even entertaining the idea of telling the person who answered the phone what your problem is, you're basically ensuring that your call gets handed off to a person who is less knowledgeable about how to fix it. They will figure it out eventually, but not as quickly as the person who deals with horseshit like yours hundreds of times per day.

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"Sounds like you just need to plug it in."

Granted, there may come a time in any phone call when a supervisor will need to get involved, but the customer service rep will know when that time has come. If you can manage to keep things pleasant or at least somewhat businesslike, they'll just put you on hold and go ask that supervisor for the OK to do whatever it is you need done. I really can't stress this enough: Not being a dick is your best move when dealing not only with customer service representatives, but just people in general. And besides, if you immediately demand a supervisor and actually get one, what you've essentially done is identified yourself as a jackass. Except now, you're talking to a person who has no fear of repercussions for not helping you. If you at least give it a shot with the actual customer service rep at first, you can use the "transfer me to a supervisor" ploy as a backup. But if you