Please note that starting your call with your location, however remote does not make your call more important. It may make us aware that you do not want to hold too long, but I repeat it does not make your call more important than if you were calling from the pub down the road. This week I have had: Mr I am calling from India, Mr I am calling from Pakistan (we have caller ID and I did not know Pakistan had 020 8... numbers) and last but not least Mr I am calling from Germany. When I was temping in the boy's school last year I was hired as a switchboard/receptionist/coffee maker/ nose bleed stopper/chewing-gum off blazer scraper/ whatever job needs doing at the time doer. It was an eye opener (I never realised just how many raving lunatics are out there with access to a telephone). I had a wonderful colleague. He was a rather senior teacher who did not feel that he was above talking to admin staff. He happened to walk into the office on day when we had put a rather obnoxious parent on speaker phone so that I would not be the only one to benefit from the abuse she was shouting down the phone. He picked up the phone introduced himself and told the woman who was still shouting down the line that we ladies certainly did not get paid enough to take this sort of abuse, and he put the phone down. I wish he had been at work with me tonight when I had to suffer 25 minutes of Mr I am calling from Germany. I am amazed I lasted that long before I put the phone down. He called back straight away. Somebody from repro had walked into my office in the meantime and took the call for me. It took him nearly 10 minutes to get rid of him. I have left a note on the switchboard warning M. that when she comes in Monday morning her first call will be "I am calling from Germany..."
I am calling from Timbuktu...
6.12.03 00:57
