Video: Purported Dell Call Center Employee Calls Customer "Little Girl"

The description on this clip calls it an "actual leaked phone conversation" to Dell. It's just lame enough to be believable, but who knows? [via Digg]

[#1 posted by h3llc4t , February 15, 2008 10:02 AM]

Dubious. I've been a call center monkey, and even in the depths of my utter hatred for my employer, I never would have done something so incredibly stupid. I've known people with deathwishes in that industry, and even then they wouldn't go to this extreme.

[#2 posted by Anonymous , February 15, 2008 10:29 AM]

umm... If it really was a recorded call center conversation, wouldn't it have the intemittent beeping denoting that the call was being "monitored for quality assurance?"

[#3 posted by Merc , February 15, 2008 10:45 AM]

Sounds like this tech support call Arnold made:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-poZ0AOZAc

[#4 posted by Anonymous , February 15, 2008 10:53 AM]

Yeah, being a former call center monkey myself, I've never heard someone go that far. You get the usual fake accent or how many weird things you can say to a customer during a call game, ie. "Geee Sir, that computer must have a hemi in it to boot that fast"

[#5 posted by Dillenger69 , February 15, 2008 11:05 AM]

Looks like the video has been pulled.

[#6 posted by h3llc4t , February 15, 2008 12:21 PM]

#2, not sure about Dell, but no beeps gave away when our calls were monitored. Many calls were recorded, and a few from each tech agent were pulled each month to review. Kept you on your toes more when you didn't know they were listening.

I actually kinda wish my very last call had been recorded, when I told the customer to call back because the Internet was full and hung up my headset for good.

[#7 posted by aerophyte , February 15, 2008 2:56 PM]

cn't rmmbr....why ws t tht hrng cb frmrs n tlt cntry (nd) bd d?

[#8 posted by Doomstalk , February 15, 2008 7:48 PM]

When I worked as a call center monkey for Citizens Bank, they recorded all of our calls, but there was no beeping. I don't think it's required.

[#9 posted by Santos , February 16, 2008 8:51 AM]

It's not required if you tell the customer up front. And the video is fake. Tech Support Reps tend to personally decorate their spaces to deal with the de-humanization that constantly dealing with the stupid brings to the job.

[#10 posted by Anonymous , February 16, 2008 10:54 AM]

Agreed, I had some personal stuff hangin on my cube (BTW those don't look like cube walls), but what about the lack of current technology. A CRT monitor? Seriously?

[#11 posted by Anonymous , February 16, 2008 7:08 PM]

I called Dell once, probably 5 or 6 years ago to ask for a price on a computer... they put me on hold forever, finally a person came back on the line and I told them I wanted a price on a computer and the guy says, "ONE MILLION DOLLARS!" in a Dr. Evil voice and hung up. True story.

[#12 posted by Anonymous , February 17, 2008 2:57 AM]

Uhm.. .obviously the video is fake? It's the call that's supposedly real?

But last I called Dell, their support was from india. While the guy on the phone was about as helpful as the video suggests, the video's guy is definately not from india.

Ex-phone monkey too, and I've heard my fair share of unbelievable shit come out of reps mouths, but sales staff usually make comission so they're the last people who are going to piss customers off usually. Make impossible promises is another story though.

[#13 posted by murray , February 17, 2008 9:24 AM]

@the previous two comments: uh, I don't think anyone is pretending the video is real. Obviously actors are playing out the parts of the people in the alleged recording. Think about it.

[#14 posted by Anonymous , February 17, 2008 11:02 AM]

Having worked at dell over the summer 2 years ago, I can say for a fact that this is true (the audio atleast). That audio clip was played to us during training by a HR rep. The audio has been edited a bit, as there was a bit more content in the origional file, more little girls, and a few other insults, and alot more drama about the floppy disk drive. But yep, other than the removed audio, that all really happened.

[#15 posted by Anonymous , March 24, 2008 9:32 AM]

Some of you are critiquing the video, but that was added in just for fun. This was a phone call, kids. OF COURSE there was no video. Do you think they had a video camera in each customer's home, too? Sheesh!

[#16 posted by PetroleumJelliffe , July 3, 2008 12:38 PM]

video moved here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sRQ7oea4VM

It's the extended (director's?) cut!

[#17 posted by Anonymous , November 28, 2008 7:18 PM]

This is a true story.. I was actually working on the site while it happened. The sales rep was actually a top former # 1 at Dell Panama city. He got fired as soon as quality found it, but I can tell you there's no beeping while a call is being record.