Choice Blog

Editors Letter: Technology Troubleshooting

"I'm sorry I did not understand what you just said," intoned the gentle voice on the other end of the phone. 

Despite the pleasant and calm female tones I felt my hackles rise and I snapped back: "No you wouldn't, because you are a machine." 

It was the end of a very frustrating afternoon trying to get some speakers to connect to a television via wi-fi. It seems far-flung call centres have now been replaced by robots. If you telephone you get a machine posing as a person that asks you to voice your problem and then says they don't understand you.

Even the speakers spoke to me, telling me they ready to connect but then wouldn't. When I shouted at them there was a stony silence!

All the time I felt a bit uneasy as though my mother could hear me being rude to those charming robot ladies and was about to put me straight as she certainly would have done in her time.

So far, the speakers remain silent but I'm planning a new attempt when my blood pressure has calmed.

A couple of issues ago I mentioned my problems of claiming my pension online. I abandoned that attempt and tried the phone. Only a brief robotic voice and I managed to speak to a very helpful real person with a Geordie accent.

It was all done in five minutes- something all companies who use these infernal robots should note. Thanks to an actual human being, by the time you read this I should be an official OAP.