How often has frustration made you want to throw the telephone against a wall after trying to get through an automated answering system? Plenty often, I’ll bet.
Maybe you want to find out why your credit card company didn’t post your payment, or why Blue Cross didn’t pay for a test your doctor ordered. You dial the company’s 800 number and you’re faced with choosing from a bewildering selection of extensions. After you finally decide which buttons to push, a computer generated voice answers and you enter telephone hell. You push this set of numbers and that set of numbers and all you get is more automated answers.
Does any business in the world still employ real people, you ask yourself.
Yep. They all do and I’m going to tell you how to reach them.
Actually, the information is not mine. It’s available on a Web site: http://www.gethuman.com. The people who put together the site deserve thanks from all of us. The information here will save you quite a few gray hairs – and telephones!
Be sure to check out the “Tips” page. At the risk of being redundant, I’ll preview some of it for you.
One of the first money-saving suggestions is how to find a company’s 800 number. Dial 1-800-555-1212. The Web site also suggests typing the company’s name and the words “phone number” into your favorite search engine. That often yields results.
If the company doesn’t have an 800 number, call 1-800-FREE-411 at no charge. That’s a heckuva lot cheaper than paying the phone company’s information fees. “Free” is usually a good thing.
Finding the 800 number doesn’t guarantee you’ll talk to a real person, of course. That’s where the Web site comes in. Click on Gethuman’s Database page and you’ll find the secrets to getting out of that infernal loop leading from one automated voice to another.
At one time, callers could circumvent the loop by pushing 0. The Web site points out that companies have gotten smarter and 0 is not the magic formula it once was. Try pushing 0# or #0 or 0* or *0 over and over again. Or try saying, “Get human” or “agent” several times. The same formula won’t work for every company so you’d be wise to make a note of the one that does, in case you might want to call the business again sometime.
The tips work. I tried a few last week and was successful every time – almost too successful. I was stumped for what to say on the first call. I didn’t want the company to know I’d cracked its code, so I just apologized and hung up.
Every phone number and code-cracker you’ll want won’t be listed in the site’s database. It understandably can’t give the listings and codes for every single business in the country. It does, however, list the largest companies – the ones most people are likely to need.
I was pleased to discover that most of the companies I do business with through their Web sites are among the easiest to reach. You might find the same thing. It’s that once-in-a-while company you never thought you’d have to talk to that can cause the most frustration. (Except for cell phone companies. They invented inconvenience.)
Good luck with the Web site. I think you’ll like it. And it could save you some real money – in headache remedy purchases!
Lee Raynor is editor of KinstonPress.com. She welcomes your comments at
leeraynor@kinstonpress.com.
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