Have you ever had to deal with a customer service rep by phone and couldn't understand a thing they were saying?

Yes, I can barely hear many callers. I just tell them right out that I can’t understand them. I just say I’m deaf, could you speak slower and louder. Sometimes I even ask if there is anyone else I can talk to.

The worst ones, though, are the ESL.

Once in a while, I get a mumbler. I just ask them to keep repeating themselves. I’ve never met an accent I couldn’t decipher. What drives me completely bananas, though, are the CSRs who have been taught to keep the call jolly, and so laugh at everything I say. It’s idiotic, and it inevitably causes me to ask to be transferred to someone who can take my concern seriously. I find this is more likely to happen when it’s an overseas call centre.

Yes, and when I do I politely say that ‘I’ll have to call back, thank you.’ Wait about 5 minutes, call again and hope I reach someone I can understand.

Yes it is the jolliness (good choice of word, @glacial) that makes it even more annoying.

Hello, Gail. May I call you “Gail”? (No.)

How are you today? (I never discuss my health with strangers.)

I am so sorry, Gail. (Don’t call me “Gail”.)

May I put you on hold, Gail? (No.)

Often when its clear that I’m talking to someone in India, I can’t make out what they’re saying at all. Generally I prefer to send an email when I can.

African American women from Atlanta. Next to impossible to understand.

You nailed it Jo Bob!! That and Louisiana.