Duke Energy, Fifth Third, and Mikhail Gorbachev for Louis Vuitton

Sitting on the phone with Duke Energy* (in my experience, they answer calls super-fast and are very friendly and helpful), transferring my service to the new place, I was catching up on my feeds and about dropped the handset when I saw this.

Um, okay.

*One portion of the conversation:

OPERATOR (in robotic, script-reading voice): Would you like to be included in Duke Energy Something-Something, our special program for something something, where our team will blah blah blah, and yadda yadda yadda, find out about new services?

ME: What’s that mean?

OPERATOR (in human voice): Basically, they contact you with new offers. You don’t hafta do it.

ME: Well, I don’t want to get junk mail or have people calling me up.

OPERATOR: Mmm-hmm.

ME: So…no thanks, I guess.

This reminded me of walking into Fifth Third Bank on Court and Main the other day, when I finally broke down and asked the teller why on earth they are forced to greet every customer who walks up to the counter with, “Welcome to Fifth Third Bank, my name is Roboto, how may I help you?”

“Well,” she said, “I guess they think it’s best if we all use a standard greeting.”

“Really? They think it’s more warm and welcoming to be spoken to from a script than to be greeted individually?”

“Yep. Don’t ask me,” she laughed. “You should tell them how you feel. They might listen to you.”

Oh, but I’m just a customer. A company that doesn’t listen to employees (who are customers of a different sort) doesn’t want to hear from me. But then I know that from experience with Fifth Third. That’s another post for another time…