Today in the UK, 47% of 12-15 year olds have a smart phone. So just under half of every junk phone call made at random to people who have not been in an accident in the last 12 months or accidentally purchased PPI ever in their lives will probably be answered by a teenager who, on average will have far more disposable time on his hands than your average call centre worker on minimum wage.
Teenagers are energetic and fun and full of imagination. As a collective, they possess the ability to think up dozens of creative ways of wasting the time of call centre people. These include:
• Agree that PPI has been mis-sold to you at some point in the past, become distraught and weep down the phone.
• Agree that PPI has been mis-sold to you at some point in the past and then become enraged and shout a lot.
• Ask call centre person how their day is going and what qualifications they got in high school.
• Pretend to speak fluent French and not understand English.
• Pretend to only speak Minion.
• Tell the cold call centre person to 'hold the line please' then mute the speaker for at least 30 seconds. Un-mute to reassure call centre person that their call is important to you and you will be available to speak shortly. Mute once more. Repeat.
• Pretend to fart down the phone.
• Try to order a pepperoni pizza.
• Ask to speak to your friend 'Ryan' at the next desk. (You know Ryan... Yes you do - Ryan! At the next desk along from you! Opposite you then... What - he's not in today then? No, he DOES work there- I spoke to him yesterday... Stop messing with me mate, I NEED to speak to him, Pleeassee!!)
• Pretend to be hit by a car mid-sentence. Have nearby friends scream and call for help.
• Pretend to be deaf and pass your phone to a mate who will adopt one of the call centre handling approaches as detailed above.
I am torn between feeling proud of my teenager's ingenuity, annoyance at the call centre company who invaded his privacy, puzzled that the whole thing was ever considered a sound business model and sympathy for Ryan - who probably did quite well in school and has targets to meet. And probably a massive wad of student debt as well.
