This is Driving Me Crazy!

[LawrenceU]

I am currently on hold with the health insurance company. I have been for the past twelve minutes. While on hold they have music playing. How nice of them. ARRRGGHHH. They play four and 3/4 measures of the same redundant electronic keyboard and oboe run and then break in and say, 'Thank you for your business. All representatives are currently assisting other callers. Please hold for the next representative.' Then they play the same four and 3/4 measures again. Then repeat / repeat / repeat . . .

Couldn't they at least complete the measure?

Give a man a break!

 

[OPC'n]

You've got a rough life! I hurt for you!

 

[JBaldwin]

Maybe they are trying to make you so frustrated that when you finally do get a real voice on the line, you will be so happy to hear a voice, you won't get angry when they finally tell you that they can't do whatever it is you want them to do. Too bad it never works.

 

[Whitefield]

There is probably a subliminal message embedded in that like "you will send us all your money."

 

[Knoxienne]

And then when you do get a voice it will be somebody in India.

Ain't globalism grand?

 

[OPC'n]

And then when you do get a voice it will be somebody in India.

Ain't globalism grand?

 

[LawrenceU]

Could be. When I finally got someone they could not help me. They said they would have to email my contact information to another office and they would contact me. And, this is in response to a phone message they left me!

But, not completing a measure? Come on. Some of us have ears. Active cadence on the part of the composer is one thing, but this? Is there no sanity?

 

[Hippo]

At least they were not repeating praise choruses to you, it could have been worse.

 

[JBaldwin]

At least they were not repeating praise choruses to you, it could have been worse.

This is a bit off topic, but I couldn't resist sharing this. The last several Saturday mornings, I've been driving my daughter to swimming lessons in the next county. While riding, we turn on the local christian radio channel to listen to the stories. At exactly 8:56 every week, they broadcast a recording of children singing a sickly praise chorus (with lots of repetions). The first week, we listened for about 30 seconds and my daughter asked me to turn it down, the second week, we heard about 5 seconds of the music and my daughter said, "Oh yuck, here comes that awful music, turn it off." The third week, as soon as the story was over my daughter said, "Mom turn the radio down so we won't have to hear that awful music." After that it was a weekly joke.

 

[Galatians220]

And then when you do get a voice it will be somebody in India.

Ain't globalism grand?

It could be worse: they could be playing Indian music before you finally reach one of their superqualified, ever so efficient representatives. We have Indian radio stations around here, along with the Arabic ones. They all constitute aggravated assaults on the ears, to say nothing of the permanent damage they must be doing to one's brain's temporal lobes. (I mean no offense to Indians. I just don't know how anyone can stand... Well. I'll stop right there. )

Our health insurer puts us on hold now and often randomly plays "Bolero" over and over again (a bit redundant, wouldn't you say? ). Another thing I heard on hold with these people once was Lou Reed's "Take a Walk on the Wild Side." Now, for anyone who isn't familiar with the song, I'm not going to explain it. (The insurer was feeding a local classic rock station.) Anyone who does know the song would understand why I, a normally peaceful individual, went nuclear when I was finally connected to the representative.

Few people know what "tasteful" is anymore. Or "polite." Especially those who decide what is going to be played while customers wait on hold.

My sympathies to you, Lawrence.

Margaret

 

[Knoxienne]

I just don't know how anyone can stand... Well. I'll stop right there.

I know... I hear ya, Sister Margaret.

 

[christiana]

It happens too often when we're on hold and I consider it 'auditory abuse'! Why do they think I prefer gross 'music' to blessed silence?

Tell them your opinion if you get the chance to truly speak with a human.

 

[VictorBravo]

That's pretty bad, Lawrence, and I feel for you. Every morning I hear a freight train go past town blowing its whistle. It's a double diminished chord: C sharp, E natural, G natural, B flat--multiple tritones just like the grand arpeggio in Bach's D minor toccata.

It blows and blows, passing farther away, blowing again, drifting into perpetual unresolution. I sometimes have to dig out my D harmonica and blast a chord just to set the world straight again.

Musical OCD: sometimes a blessing, often a curse.

 

[Hippo]

It could be worse: they could be playing Indian music before you finally reach one of their superqualified, ever so efficient representatives.

I like Indian music and usually watch a bollywood film at the weekend, it is good for the soul to break out of the culteral straightjacket every now and then.

Saying that I have never got to grips with West Indian food, give me sausage and chips any day.

 

[Laura]

Yes, I always wonder myself what is wrong with plain old silence. Even their ads for their new health-care plans or whatever are better than music. Some places I have called play lovely classical music, even entire songs, but it sounds comical with all the static and crackling on the line, like it's a phonograph from 1915 supplying their music.

 

[Theognome]

Hold music can be funny, too. In my job, I call contracting companies all day, and am often put on hold. One of the funniest was when I was calling an HVAC company, and was put on hold. Their hold music was a feed from a local radio station, and for the entire time I was on hold (only a minute) I heard a commercial for their local competitor.

I mentioned this to the owner, and two days later when I called again and was put on hold, they had a new hold system with their own ads being repeated.

Theognome

 

[Kim G]

Yes, I always wonder myself what is wrong with plain old silence. Even their ads for their new health-care plans or whatever are better than music.

When I found out I was pregnant in January I called my gynocologist (I'd only been there once) and was put on hold for a few minutes. The office ads started with family planning help, followed by abortion options and birth control ads. I hung up and called my Christian friend who is a midwife. Any office that delivers babies yet blatantly advertises abortions on their on-hold messages is not getting business from me!

 

[Laura]

Yes, I always wonder myself what is wrong with plain old silence. Even their ads for their new health-care plans or whatever are better than music.

When I found out I was pregnant in January I called my gynocologist (I'd only been there once) and was put on hold for a few minutes. The office ads started with family planning help, followed by abortion options and birth control ads. I hung up and called my Christian friend who is a midwife. Any office that delivers babies yet blatantly advertises abortions on their on-hold messages is not getting business from me!

Ew. Okay, that's an exception. Probably made a good choice with the midwife anyway you look at it...

Okay, way off topic, but I learned the other day that in Spanish the word for "miscarriage" is aborto involuntario, while "abortion" is---you guessed it---simply aborto voluntario. Kind of weird how the linguistic distinction is only a matter of wanting your baby to die or not wanting your baby to die.

 

[LawrenceU]

Musical OCD: sometimes a blessing, often a curse.

Too true.

 

[Laura]

LOL. On the phone with a pharmacy, I'm listening to Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata. Sure enough, sounds like a recording from the early 20th century. But can't complain!

 

[Knoxienne]

This thread reminds me of an episode of the sit-com Mama's Family when Mama's on the phone with 911 because an escapee from Juvenile Hall is lurking around her property.

"They put me on Muzak. They want ya to listen to Barry Manilow while you're waitin' for your throat to be slit".

 

[Rich Koster]

I spent 32 minutes on hold today listening to the same few bars of jazz trying to get an unemployment rep. When they finally picked up the phone, I was asked why I was calling and after a "one moment, I'm having trouble hearing you, they hung up.

 

[Theoretical]

Silence is fine, though it should have a periodic beep or something to let you know they haven't hung up.

One of the top 5 most irritating things was calling an office, waiting on the line for 45 minutes and then getting auto-disconnected without speaking to anyone.

 

[jambo]

A few years a go I phoned up a company and was put on hold. The tune being played was "Thine be the Glory" I could not make up my mind whether this was a company owned by Christians or just a company that liked "Hail the Conquering Hero Returns".

Vivadi's "Four Seasons" is quite a common tune companys use but why is it always on spring?