2. Read the article and find the answers to these questions.

1. What do people find most annoying on the phone?

2. What three reasons for the rise in phone rage are given? Do you agree?

3. Are telephone techniques improving?

4. What do you think is meant by remote working?

Bad line on behaviour

What drives you to lose your temper on the telephone? Being kept waiting, being connected to voice mail or being passed on to someone else are all common flashpoints. But what infuriates people most of all is talking to someone who sounds inattentive, unconcerned or insincere, according to a survey published recently.

The study by Reed Employment Services, a recruitment company, found that nearly two-thirds of people feel that ‘phone rage’ – people losing their temper on the telephone – has become more common over the past five years. More than half the respondents, who were from 536 organisations, said that they themselves had lost their tempers on the phone this year.

The reasons for this are threefold, according to Reed. People are much more likely to express anger over the phone, rather than in writing or face-to-face. Moreover, telephone usage has been rising steeply over recent years. Increasing numbers of transactions take place entirely by phone, from arranging insurance to paying bills.

In addition, people’s expectations have risen. Nearly three-quarters of respondents to the Reed survey said they are more confident that their problems can be solved over the telephone than they were five years ago.

Companies were taking steps to improve their staff’s telephone answering techniques. The survey found that 70 per cent of organisations require their staff to answer the telephone with a formal company greeting. In 43 per cent of organisations, staff have to give their own names when they answer the telephone.

But a third of organisations do not give any training, or they train only their receptionists. That may not be enough, the report says. As companies move towards ‘remote working’, they need for the right tone of voice extends to every level of the organization.

3. A) When was the last time you called an organization for information? What happened?

Have you ever made a business call? Do you agree with the following statement?

‘More business is lost through bad service than by poor product performance.’

b) Work in pairs and write a list of skills which a telephone receptionist is to have?

4. Read the text and compare your list of skills with that presented here. Ringing in the millions

Companies lose millions of dollars of business through bad telephone handling. A survey found that company switchboards failed to answer one out of five calls within ten rings, or reply to10% of calls within 20 rings. Ninety per cent of all sales enquiries begin on the phone, so this is an opportunity to project a healthy company image – one of friendliness, efficiency and professionalism. Staff should be aware that bad telephone behaviour can result in millions of dollars in lost revenue. In the insurance business, for example, failure to answer promptly could see a policy of a quarter of a million dollars go straight to the competition!

A single telephone receptionist can answer as many as 300,000 calls a year. Companies should train personnel in the skills of transferring a call, placing calls on hold, dealing with angry callers, answering correspondence by phone, using caller’s name, and taking messages correctly. Callers should not hear expressions like ‘she’s just gone out’ or ‘he’s not with us anymore’. Surveys show that customers want a prompt response by a real person (not a machine) who can make a decision.

For a great many of a firm’s customers, the first – and often the only – impression they carry in their minds is the one generated by the people they talk on the phone. The quality of a firm’s response to a call is one of the chief factors in creating a perception of good or bad service. And remember, more business is lost through bad service than by poor product performance.