Not Going To Happen 'Cause I'm Not Harry Potter (Impossible Patron Requests)

[Goosey]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

[bloo]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

[Firecat]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

One of my biggest pet peeves is people who call repeatedly but refuse to leave a voicemail. I'm not always at my desk, and even when I am, sometimes I'm not able to pick up a call. Answering the phone is not necessarily my first priority if I'm in the middle of something (my boss knows and agrees with this).

I don't get a ton of calls, but if someone leaves me a voicemail, I either return it promptly (within 1-2 business days at the most, often the same day) or I arrange for someone else to do so if it's a question or issue best addressed by someone else. Nevertheless, there are a few people who seem to insist on repeatedly calling without ever leaving a voicemail...and it's incredibly annoying.

And while I'm at it, if you do leave a voicemail, don't just say "this is Person X, call me." Give me some idea what you need; trust me, it's much more efficient that way. Even if you just tell me, "This is Person X, I have questions about A, B, and C. Please call me back at xxx-xxx-xxxx." It's not difficult!

[Hillia]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

One of my biggest pet peeves is people who call repeatedly but refuse to leave a voicemail. I'm not always at my desk, and even when I am, sometimes I'm not able to pick up a call. Answering the phone is not necessarily my first priority if I'm in the middle of something (my boss knows and agrees with this).

I don't get a ton of calls, but if someone leaves me a voicemail, I either return it promptly (within 1-2 business days at the most, often the same day) or I arrange for someone else to do so if it's a question or issue best addressed by someone else. Nevertheless, there are a few people who seem to insist on repeatedly calling without ever leaving a voicemail...and it's incredibly annoying.

And while I'm at it, if you do leave a voicemail, don't just say "this is Person X, call me." Give me some idea what you need; trust me, it's much more efficient that way. Even if you just tell me, "This is Person X, I have questions about A, B, and C. Please call me back at xxx-xxx-xxxx." It's not difficult!

Building on this, if I've taken the time to leave a voicemail saying, 'Hi, this is Hillia in the xxx department; I need to find out if the Veeblefinster report will be ready by Tuesday and if not, when it will be ready,' please don't call me back and say, 'Uh, hey...you called  me?'

[Mel the Redcap]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

Over the phone, I sound like my sister. We both sound like our mother. My three nieces all sound like my sister (but not like me or our mother, oddly enough). Yeeeah, just saying who you are right at the beginning is the best plan!

[Dindrane]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

One of my biggest pet peeves is people who call repeatedly but refuse to leave a voicemail. I'm not always at my desk, and even when I am, sometimes I'm not able to pick up a call. Answering the phone is not necessarily my first priority if I'm in the middle of something (my boss knows and agrees with this).

I don't get a ton of calls, but if someone leaves me a voicemail, I either return it promptly (within 1-2 business days at the most, often the same day) or I arrange for someone else to do so if it's a question or issue best addressed by someone else. Nevertheless, there are a few people who seem to insist on repeatedly calling without ever leaving a voicemail...and it's incredibly annoying.

And while I'm at it, if you do leave a voicemail, don't just say "this is Person X, call me." Give me some idea what you need; trust me, it's much more efficient that way. Even if you just tell me, "This is Person X, I have questions about A, B, and C. Please call me back at xxx-xxx-xxxx." It's not difficult!

I'm okay with someone calling without leaving a voicemail if they're not needing to talk to me specifically (i.e. I am one of several people who can help them and their issue is urgent enough that they try a few numbers before leaving a voicemail with anyone). I'm also fine with it if they call on the offchance i'm there, but send me an email instead of leaving me a voicemail. Some things are too complicated to leave any sort of explanatory verbal message.

But what absolutely gets me every time are the people who either call without leaving me any sort of message, and then act sort of put-out when they do finally catch me on the phone (like I'm supposed to magically understand that "missed call without voicemail" means "call back right away because it's urgent"). Or the people who come up to my desk in person and need things from me that can't realistically be delivered on the spot. I work in HR, and people ask me a lot of questions that require research, or that I have to spend some time thinking about or figuring out. I might be able to give you a close approximation of the answer you want on the spot, but a lot of the time, I'm not going to. There is always a better than average chance that my answer will be something other than 100% correct, and you'll run with it before I have the chance to correct it.

I have a few coworkers whose MO is basically to call repeatedly until they get me on the phone (and/or come up to my desk), but rarely if ever leave me messages or send me emails to give me any idea of what it is they want. They then get frustrated at the length of time it takes me to get them the information they want, since I'm not able to pull it out of a hat the moment they ask for it. My memory is very good, but I can promise that nobody wants me to treat it like it's infallible.

[Petticoats]

<snip>
My bosses are trying to figure out how to explain that since the client was two and a half months late with the files (we still don't have them all), there's no way we can meet the original due date. Moving the due date up is simply not possible.

Why don't your bosses just say that--"Since you were two and a half months late with the files and still haven't even give us all of them--and routinely halt our work for two or three weeks while we wait for you to answer queries--there's no way we can meet your original deadline"?

Or are these the kind of clients who will get huffy and throw tantrums if you confront them with the truth? Many of mine are, unfortunately, so I know how it is.

[Thipu1]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

This sort of thing used to happen all the time at the library.  It's a very specialized library and visitors would tend to remember us far more than we remembered them. 

It wasn't odd to get a phone call and hear the caller start with a perky, 'Hi!  I'm Bill!'

Okay, we want to be polite but we deal with at least a few dozen 'Bills' a year and, as it turns out, this 'Bill' hasn't been to see us in three years.  You could hear the air go out of their balloons when we didn't remember what their area of research was and could provide an instant update on new material. 

[camlan]

<snip>
My bosses are trying to figure out how to explain that since the client was two and a half months late with the files (we still don't have them all), there's no way we can meet the original due date. Moving the due date up is simply not possible.

Why don't your bosses just say that--"Since you were two and a half months late with the files and still haven't even give us all of them--and routinely halt our work for two or three weeks while we wait for you to answer queries--there's no way we can meet your original deadline"?

Or are these the kind of clients who will get huffy and throw tantrums if you confront them with the truth? Many of mine are, unfortunately, so I know how it is.

My bosses have been telling them that.

The clients seem to live in a special world where whatever they want comes true.

Unfortunately for the clients, at the moment our company is one of the very few actually doing this work, so they don't have a lot of choice if they want to get huffy.

And in mixed blessings for my company, there are several other clients who have arranged to send us work, but now all the bosses are meeting to figure out how to deal with the deadlines, as this first client has messed up deadlines for other clients reaching out into next year.

And this client is supposed to be the leader in the field.

[camlan]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

One of my biggest pet peeves is people who call repeatedly but refuse to leave a voicemail. I'm not always at my desk, and even when I am, sometimes I'm not able to pick up a call. Answering the phone is not necessarily my first priority if I'm in the middle of something (my boss knows and agrees with this).

I don't get a ton of calls, but if someone leaves me a voicemail, I either return it promptly (within 1-2 business days at the most, often the same day) or I arrange for someone else to do so if it's a question or issue best addressed by someone else. Nevertheless, there are a few people who seem to insist on repeatedly calling without ever leaving a voicemail...and it's incredibly annoying.

And while I'm at it, if you do leave a voicemail, don't just say "this is Person X, call me." Give me some idea what you need; trust me, it's much more efficient that way. Even if you just tell me, "This is Person X, I have questions about A, B, and C. Please call me back at xxx-xxx-xxxx." It's not difficult!

Building on this, if I've taken the time to leave a voicemail saying, 'Hi, this is Hillia in the xxx department; I need to find out if the Veeblefinster report will be ready by Tuesday and if not, when it will be ready,' please don't call me back and say, 'Uh, hey...you called  me?'

That annoys me no end.

You've left them all the info they need. Easy peasy to send you a quick email with yes, it will be ready or no, it won't but it should be ready on X date. Call if you have questions.

But instead, they waste your time (and theirs) calling and basically starting the whole issue from scratch.

Drives me nuts.

[dawnfire]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

Over the phone, I sound like my sister. We both sound like our mother. My three nieces all sound like my sister (but not like me or our mother, oddly enough). Yeeeah, just saying who you are right at the beginning is the best plan!

Over the phone my father, my brother and eldest sound the same.

[HoneyBee42]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

One of my biggest pet peeves is people who call repeatedly but refuse to leave a voicemail. I'm not always at my desk, and even when I am, sometimes I'm not able to pick up a call. Answering the phone is not necessarily my first priority if I'm in the middle of something (my boss knows and agrees with this).

I don't get a ton of calls, but if someone leaves me a voicemail, I either return it promptly (within 1-2 business days at the most, often the same day) or I arrange for someone else to do so if it's a question or issue best addressed by someone else. Nevertheless, there are a few people who seem to insist on repeatedly calling without ever leaving a voicemail...and it's incredibly annoying.

And while I'm at it, if you do leave a voicemail, don't just say "this is Person X, call me." Give me some idea what you need; trust me, it's much more efficient that way. Even if you just tell me, "This is Person X, I have questions about A, B, and C. Please call me back at xxx-xxx-xxxx." It's not difficult!

Building on this, if I've taken the time to leave a voicemail saying, 'Hi, this is Hillia in the xxx department; I need to find out if the Veeblefinster report will be ready by Tuesday and if not, when it will be ready,' please don't call me back and say, 'Uh, hey...you called  me?'

That annoys me no end.

You've left them all the info they need. Easy peasy to send you a quick email with yes, it will be ready or no, it won't but it should be ready on X date. Call if you have questions.

But instead, they waste your time (and theirs) calling and basically starting the whole issue from scratch.

Drives me nuts.

Or (I work in insurance follow-up)--I call and leave a message with the insurance including pt name and date of service that I need info about.  The callback is "oh, I couldn't understand the pt name" (I always slow down and if it's a difficult name, I even spell it with a "c as in charlie" or "z as in zebra" or other such hard to distinguish letters).  Odds are that even if they call me back same day (rare), I will have worked at least six to seven more accounts since the call.  I keep a little log of pt names/accounts that I've left a message for.  But if you call me back the next day and say you couldn't understand the pt name, it's just been a waste of both of our time because I'm going to have a hard time locating the pt to pull the account back up. 

[MrTango]

Or (I work in insurance follow-up)--I call and leave a message with the insurance including pt name and date of service that I need info about.  The callback is "oh, I couldn't understand the pt name" (I always slow down and if it's a difficult name, I even spell it with a "c as in charlie" or "z as in zebra" or other such hard to distinguish letters).  Odds are that even if they call me back same day (rare), I will have worked at least six to seven more accounts since the call.  I keep a little log of pt names/accounts that I've left a message for.  But if you call me back the next day and say you couldn't understand the pt name, it's just been a waste of both of our time because I'm going to have a hard time locating the pt to pull the account back up.

Are you able to add the clinic's name and phone number to your log?  That way, you could search the log by those values for a recent entry.

[Library Dragon]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

This sort of thing used to happen all the time at the library.  It's a very specialized library and visitors would tend to remember us far more than we remembered them. 

It wasn't odd to get a phone call and hear the caller start with a perky, 'Hi!  I'm Bill!'

Okay, we want to be polite but we deal with at least a few dozen 'Bills' a year and, as it turns out, this 'Bill' hasn't been to see us in three years.  You could hear the air go out of their balloons when we didn't remember what their area of research was and could provide an instant update on new material.

Or when I run into patrons in the supermarket and they ask me to renew their books.

At my parish school parents would come up to me after Mass and ask what books their kids had checked out.  We had over 450 students. 

Sorry, no to both.

[o_gal]

I think this is kind of right here...

I work with over 200 people. I've only ever talked to a few of them on the phone and never with any regularity. So why, when they call me, do they say, "Do you know who this is?" No, dude, I don't. Because I've never talked to you over the phone before. You must give me more detail.

One of a few pet peeves of mine is people who don't identify themselves when calling. I always do it, even for my family (especially now since my teen DD and I apparently have the same voice over the phone). It would make the calls go so much faster if people would just skip the guessing game.

And sometimes it can backfire on them spectacularly. When I was in college, my Mom worked as the secretary at our church. She is fantastic at recognizing people by voice over the phone - they could just call up and start speaking to her and she'd know who they were without them having to say "this is XXX". Me, not so much but everyone assumed I had the same talent. I developed a standard response of "this is her daughter, you should probably call her at the church."

One morning I'm home and get a phone call from a woman who just started talking and telling me that "Dotty died". We had more than one woman at church who went by the knickname, so I did my standard spiel of "I'm sorry, I don't recognize your voice, why don't you just call my Mom at church?" But the caller was insistent that I recognize that "Dotty died! ... Dotty! ... DOTTY!". I kept telling her that I didn't recognize her voice, I didn't know who "Dotty" was, and could she please just call Mom at the church? Until in anger, she said "It's your Aunt XXX and your GRANDFATHER died!" - "Daddy" has come across as "Dotty". She apologized later and said that she wasn't thinking when I kept telling her that I didn't recognize her voice, and that she didn't want to call my Mom at the church, for whatever reason that I can't remember right now