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un... believable
Dec. 9th, 2006 09:15 pmThis is by far, the most absurd customer support call I have ever heard. Of all the dumb, annoying, customer support people I've talked to on the phone, this makes any difficulties I've had seem utterly trivial. Ladies and gentlemen, behold the depths of math illiteracy of Verizon Wireless:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gp0HyxQv97Q&eurl=
http://verizonmath.blogspot.com/
http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=210830&cid=17173548
http://verizonfails.ytmnd.com/
The remix, to the tune of Pink Floyd's Money:
http://media.putfile.com/Verizon-Cant-Do-Math-Money-Remix-By-Davman
What really gets me about this is that, not only do they not seem to understand the difference between dollars and cents, but every time he explains it to them (which he does again, and again, and again in as clear and simple and patient language as possible), it's like they just go blank and right when you think they're going to have an "aha! I see what you're saying" moment, they go right back to repeatedly and explicitly denying that dollars per kilobyte is not the same thing as cents per kilobyte! I could understand if they made the mistake once or twice... but how can they just keep denying basic facts about currency? Are they trained by company policy to play dumb in order to scam people delibrately? Or are they really this incapable of understanding currency and decimals? This is literally 3rd grade math (http://www.aaamath.com/grade3.html -- I looked up the grade level on the web, because I thought I might be going crazy here). In the US, as early as 1st grade, you're supposed to know how to write down a dollar and cents amount without confusing the cents with the dollars. In order to pass 3rd grade, every child (typically about 8 years old) is supposed to know what a decimal is, and the difference between a tenth, a hundredth, and a thousandth. (I assume the situation is similar in other countries, but with different currencies.) All 4 of the Verizon Wireless customer service reps he talks to (the last 2 of which are in the mp3 here) repeatedly argued with him again and again when he tried to explain 3rd grade math to them. Each one he talked to, instead of finally agreeing with him, becomes more and more insistent that units don't matter in calculating an amount. One of them even says "it's a matter of opinion."
What is going on with this society we live in... do people take 3rd grade, and then somehow pass 4th thru 12th grade without understanding decimals? Or do they pass them all understanding them, and then forget it after they get their first job? The weirdest part of the conversation is when the big boss, the manager, says "I don't agree that .002 dollars is different from .002 cents, because there's no such thing as .002 dollars." This is where I start to think they are just putting him on in order to cover their asses after conning people into signing up for their service and then charging them 100 times their advertised price... WTF?!?
[Poll #885650]
I have been leaning towards A, but I have been known to overestimate people's math skills in the past (although I can't recall ever having run across this extreme a case of math illiteracy), perhaps due to being around math and science people most of my life. While I can understand confusing the two momentarily in casual conversation if you're not used to using decimals for your job, I have a really tough time buying that they are sincere here by the end, after he's gone over it so many times. This is what I mean when I say that sometimes you can have conversations with people and all of a sudden they will just say nonsensical things. Computers fail current Turing tests once they say non sequiturs, but if I read a transcript of this phone conversation without hearing their voices, I would be hard pressed to agree that it was actually a real adult human saying these things. At most, I could imagine a homeless person who had almost no contact with society for most of their life. A person with a job in an office somewhere where they are allowed to talk to customers? No way, nuh uh.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gp0HyxQv97Q&eurl=
http://verizonmath.blogspot.com/
http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=210830&cid=17173548
http://verizonfails.ytmnd.com/
The remix, to the tune of Pink Floyd's Money:
http://media.putfile.com/Verizon-Cant-Do-Math-Money-Remix-By-Davman
What really gets me about this is that, not only do they not seem to understand the difference between dollars and cents, but every time he explains it to them (which he does again, and again, and again in as clear and simple and patient language as possible), it's like they just go blank and right when you think they're going to have an "aha! I see what you're saying" moment, they go right back to repeatedly and explicitly denying that dollars per kilobyte is not the same thing as cents per kilobyte! I could understand if they made the mistake once or twice... but how can they just keep denying basic facts about currency? Are they trained by company policy to play dumb in order to scam people delibrately? Or are they really this incapable of understanding currency and decimals? This is literally 3rd grade math (http://www.aaamath.com/grade3.html -- I looked up the grade level on the web, because I thought I might be going crazy here). In the US, as early as 1st grade, you're supposed to know how to write down a dollar and cents amount without confusing the cents with the dollars. In order to pass 3rd grade, every child (typically about 8 years old) is supposed to know what a decimal is, and the difference between a tenth, a hundredth, and a thousandth. (I assume the situation is similar in other countries, but with different currencies.) All 4 of the Verizon Wireless customer service reps he talks to (the last 2 of which are in the mp3 here) repeatedly argued with him again and again when he tried to explain 3rd grade math to them. Each one he talked to, instead of finally agreeing with him, becomes more and more insistent that units don't matter in calculating an amount. One of them even says "it's a matter of opinion."
What is going on with this society we live in... do people take 3rd grade, and then somehow pass 4th thru 12th grade without understanding decimals? Or do they pass them all understanding them, and then forget it after they get their first job? The weirdest part of the conversation is when the big boss, the manager, says "I don't agree that .002 dollars is different from .002 cents, because there's no such thing as .002 dollars." This is where I start to think they are just putting him on in order to cover their asses after conning people into signing up for their service and then charging them 100 times their advertised price... WTF?!?
[Poll #885650]
I have been leaning towards A, but I have been known to overestimate people's math skills in the past (although I can't recall ever having run across this extreme a case of math illiteracy), perhaps due to being around math and science people most of my life. While I can understand confusing the two momentarily in casual conversation if you're not used to using decimals for your job, I have a really tough time buying that they are sincere here by the end, after he's gone over it so many times. This is what I mean when I say that sometimes you can have conversations with people and all of a sudden they will just say nonsensical things. Computers fail current Turing tests once they say non sequiturs, but if I read a transcript of this phone conversation without hearing their voices, I would be hard pressed to agree that it was actually a real adult human saying these things. At most, I could imagine a homeless person who had almost no contact with society for most of their life. A person with a job in an office somewhere where they are allowed to talk to customers? No way, nuh uh.
