The Script Said I Had to Call Him By His Full Name Every Time

I worked the retention line for an internet company I will not name, though you have almost certainly screamed at someone like me, and I forgive you.

We had a script. Corporate loved that script the way normal people love their own children. And buried in the script was a rule, handed down by a regional manager named Diane, that we had to address each customer by their full name -- first and last -- a minimum of three times per call. It "built rapport." Diane had a slide about it. There was a pie chart.

So picture me, headset on, forty calls deep, when a man gets connected whose name, according to my screen, was Richard Bottomley.

"Thank you for calling, Richard Bottomley," I said. "How can I help you today, Richard Bottomley?"

There was a pause. "...You can just say Richard."

Now here is the thing. I wanted to just say Richard. Every cell in my body wanted to just say Richard. But Diane did quality reviews. Diane listened to random calls and counted the full names on a little tally sheet, and if you came up short you got a "coaching session," which is corporate for being talked at in a small room until you agree to stop being a person.

"I understand, Richard Bottomley," I said, dying inside. "Let me pull up your account, Richard Bottomley."

He wanted to cancel. Of course he wanted to cancel. His bill had gone up forty dollars for no reason anyone could explain, including me, especially me. And my job was not to help him. My job was to read the "value stack," which was a list of reasons his internet was actually a gift and he should be grateful.

"Before we do that, Richard Bottomley," I read, "I'd love to share everything your plan includes."

"Please stop saying my whole name."

"I completely understand your frustration, Richard Bottomley."

I could hear him breathing. I could hear the exact moment a man decides he is going to file a complaint. "Is this a bit," he said. "Are you being forced to do this."

And reader, I was not allowed to say yes. But I also could not, in good conscience, say no. So I said, in the most careful voice I have ever used, "I am contractually unable to answer that, Richard Bottomley."

There was a long silence. And then Richard Bottomley started laughing. Really laughing, the kind where you can hear a person give up on being angry because the situation has passed anger and arrived somewhere holy.

"Okay," he said. "Okay. Keep your job. Don't cancel it. Just -- for the love of God, transfer me to someone who is allowed to be a human being."

I transferred him to my coworker Marcus, who did not follow the script, ever, and who had somehow never been fired. I like to think Richard Bottomley got his forty dollars back. I never found out.

Diane pulled that call for review. I hit my full-name quota three times over. I got a gold star sticker on the team board.

I peeled it off and put it on the underside of my desk, where it stays to this day, a small monument to the day I said "Richard Bottomley" nine times to a man who just wanted to save some money.