Call centres are funny places filled with funny people who take calls from funny not 'haha' funny people every day. But fuck me, are they mundane places to work.

So when you get that sudden rock of the boat, it really makes your day.

The first instance of this type of occurence was during my training at Tesco when the fire alarm went off; everyone just carried on for a bit until the management started to get up and clap us and herd us out. In the middle of my call, buzzed to the gills, I said to the lady 'I have to go! There's a fire!' It was all so dramatic and fun. My friend there told her customer she had to vacate the building because of the fire alarm and he actually said "What about my chicken livers?" Which is something I think I'll remember forever like some sort of buddhist question with no answer all about selfishness or something.
We all got to stand outside in the sun for about half an hour, and there was this wild electricity around everyone, they were trying to look like they didn't care, but there was this feeling everyone was secretely thrilled and excited. I loved it, I could have bathed in that feeling forever.

Anyway, something happened again today. Me and my closest compadres work the Store Reception part of the centre, it's all transfrs to departments, message passing, product searching - it's pointless. Anyway, we have to log every pointless call on a system called Pinpoint (PinPOINTLESS yeeaaah, high five). This system has all the information we need to do what we do, all the extensions, store information, product info, EVERYTHING.

Well, about 6 this evening Pinpoint went down. One by one us store reception types stood up, eyes glazed, looking around, headsets hung round our necks. It was like in a film where we'd all been brainwashed, as if scientology kicked in and we were rising zombie-like to our master. Then people started gesturing, like in silent movies, real over the top; one hand on hip, other hand balled into a fist, throwing a downward punch 'darn!' the subtitle would have been. Then the gestures were shrugging enthusiastically, hands outwards, 'oh no!' subtitle, palm glides to screen, 'it's...broken!'.

All hell broke loose, it was awesome. Everyone was running around like chicken little, 'The system's broken! The system's broken!' 'Quick! Activity code NOT READY 23!! Quickly!' 'No keep taking calls! Just guess the common extensions and put them through!' 'How will we log the calls HOW WILL WE LOG THE CALLS!'

Bloody brilliant. Eventually they had me answering the phone saying "Good evening Tesco customer service Amy speaking how can I help...our system's broken please call back later." What a gip! Then we had to log all this useless information by writing IN PEN ... ON PAPER (they rocked us back to the dark ages man, it was whack) and it was all just fantastic stuff, I couldn't stop grinning.

I like chaos like that, the minor chaos. I like seeing everyone running blind and wild.

My shift ended about 30 minutes after that, so luckily I didn't have to put up with it for too long, before it became mundane too.

I rode my bike home in the rain so fast and excited, through every puddle, I accidently ran over a snail. I was totally wired from the breakdown.

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On another work related note I have a disciplinary meeting on Friday about my absences *bites nails*. I asked for a union rep to represent me, like I was saying "I ain't sayin' nuttin' more without my lawyer present," I have been sck a lot lately. Ain't my fault.

Being trained on Grocery Home Shopping starting a week tomorrow, exciting!

Also, my team leader (how dorky) left me a note saying how I was the only one the have all green stats that week. You know why? Cause I hate talking to people, I get them on and off the phone ASAP. As such my productivity is high and my call times are short as fuck.

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I never said we got rabbits - we got rabbits! Photo blog coming up.

Also: review of Snuff - Chuck Palahniuk

Keep reading...start reading.

AMII
xoxoxoxox