Ice

really makes me mad, this company just hangs up on me saying how they dont take relay calls, they gave a reason too "they just take too long" wtf is that?

THK U DIALING
8008456471RINGING 1...
2...
(F)
(INTRO CALL PLS HLD)
were unable to do them due to time restraints so im the operator i cant wait for a responce we re just unable to take em
(CALLED PARTY HAS HUNG UP)

i complained to them about it last week and they said "oh the girl is new she thought it was an international collect call.."

liars, i filed a BBB complaint for cust service issue, is there anything else i can do here?

maybe we should ALL call them and just drive them crazy with relay calls

Deafness

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lumbingmi

Boy, this is wrong forum for discuss abt this but here's what I do whenever I make any relay calls and company/pp hang up on me.

I always tell relay operator DO NOT ANNOUNCE YOURSELF AS RELAY OPERATOR but rather say "this is (your name) and proceed with what you want to say". Sometime I would say, " I am speaking for other deaf person who need help. blah.. etc.." So that way it is still third party conversation.

The reason why hearing people hang up on you is because they might thought relay service is spammer or adversiting service.

Sad, there are some hearing people who are clueless and its our responsbility to educate them

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jillio

Yeah, you can file a complaint with the Dept. of Justice. This is a violation of the ADA.

Brian

Ice... just wondering if you had the relay operator and other person wait on for you to type?

If so, don't try to make them wait on you.

Some deaf people do that all the times. Relay operators have every right to end calls if they don't get responses promptly.

Ice

i didnt even get a chance to repond, feel free to call the number yourself and see what happens

i use i711

wildzerica06

nah that's what emails and text messages for? I don't use i711 relay or ip relay that much those days..

Dennis

NAD Files Complaint against Online Retailer that Refused a Relay Call - National Association of the Deaf

Look what happens when people refuse to accept relay calls....

I know you probably just wanted to complain, but if you really want to stick it to them, first complain to the relay service and ask to be directed to resources to file official complaints with the government.

kyleb

i have called up that nbr and asked them to search the forums for this post so that they can read this post up and find out what u have done

kyleb

and by the way, i just made another relay caall to them (without asking the opr to announce my name) to see if they would accept the call, and they did. so apparently things have changed

Angel

hmmm....I get the impression that maybe the person who took the call from the relay isn't familiar with how this works etc....Some business employees do hang up by mistaking the call for a telephone solicitation, when it really wasn't...so maybe if you explain to them the reason why you call through a relay service or speak to someone in charge, then you may get a good result at the end....Most employees may not be so familiar to this, I have had my share of hang up calls too from business as well, but after I called them back and explain the reason why I was using it in the first place, they would apologize and said it would not happen again, but some business do not care cause they don't have time to deal with this service or a deaf person, if that the case, then they lose my buisness as a customer..pfft

Angel

Ah, there you go!

Ice

you are mistaken, i called many times and got males and females and always was hung up on, ive already filed a complaint with the BBB and the DOJ

and no im not just one to omplain, this first happened over 10 days ago, i was annoyed but i just had a hearing friend call, then i really needed to speak with them about an order and i mean what do i have to harass my friends just so i can conduct a sale with them?

i am not some unwelcome house-guest

Roadrunner

Thread was moved to appropriate forum--







~RR

Angel

Okayyyy....

snakeplissken22

Hmm, something along this subject matter has been touched upon in other forums. Alot of businesses these days do not want to take relay calls because so many of them are Nigerian Scam calls. I know, as a relay operator, just how many fraud calls that we get. Some businesses have lost literally thousands as a result. I had a call one time, where the business owner started screaming at me about " Do you realize how much money I lost because of one of these calls?,"
I'll tell you who is to blame for alot of this, the phone companies themselves. The rules are set up in such a way, that our relay explanation scripts are downright confusing and 90% of our rules are made to accomadate the people that abuse relay. ( In addition to scam calls, lots of kids think that it is funny to use a relay operator to prank call businesses and homes, most kids seem to find it hilarious to have an operator voice things that they are too cowardly to say). I have had calls, where I as an operator, ( and many other operators) have gotten into trouble for trying to help the deaf user by breaking protocol. Several times, I have had, for example doctor's offices hang up on me saying " We are not interested in buying relay",. Now, when the deaf user instructed me to redial, rather than announce relay I said " I am an operator with a deaf caller that is trying to schedule an appt,". They always become apologetic, generally saying stuff like " OH OH , I am sorry I thought you were a telemarketing service,". Here is the bad part. My company wrote me up and gave me a warning for doing so. According to the supervisor who wrote me up, I was supposed to announce relay and unless the business asked me specifically what is relay? I was not supposed to tell them anything about it being a service for the deaf, I was just supposed to stick to the explanation script as to how it works. I am telling you, if there is anyone that needs to be complained to, it is the phone companies that allow the system to be run by scam callers, kids playing pranks and having rules that make it almost impossible to help the very people that they are supposed to be servicing.

Nesmuth

You gotta hound on the NAD folks to take in your case. Theyre in a 450,000 feet deep hole and their swords are half as long as they were 10 yrs ago. Kelby "the goalie" Brick is not there any more. NAD these days is more like a blow up doll than a marble statue.

Richard

AmIAnOprQQ

this is not accurate at all. the operator has no right to end the call. we sure as hell wish we did in certain cases. but we are not able to tell the business that was called "ok no plm have a good one and thk u for not accepting the call." the opr can only type what was said and while waiting on a reply be ready to type (WHILE U TYPED... and then relay as much as u can and then tell the text user that the person has hung up. the only thing we can tell the voice user is "the caller will be informed." relay operators are not permitted to make any decisions in the converstation. if i had my way, i would never handle a call that dials a recording to fill out an application for a job. there have been severals calls lately where the deaf person is filling out an application via relay service. this takes FOREVER. in case u guys didnt know, every time u see (ENTERING NBR) we have to hang up and redial and keep entering the info over and over and over again. this can come to be a plm when u are paying a bill since it can, potentially, charge u over and over and over again. if i had the ability, i would end the call and tell the deaf person "ur bill was paid if i redial its going to charge u again. do you really want to do this qq" so anyways, my point is that the opr cannot make decisions in the conversation.

Taoye

Part of the problem is that you really can't do a relay call with someone without introducing and explaining what is going on.

The person we call will get confused, they will get annoyed with the delays, they will wonder what is going on, and we as relay operators must remain transparent on our calls...we can't just make something up or have small talk with them.... and we are not allowed to use the words "deaf or heard of hearing" in our explanations unless you the caller tells us to. So sometimes it can be a challenge!

It is very important that we are able to explain relay, and if they hang up (and they do... and I really hate it when they do!), perhaps consider giving instructions like "redial and before intro call explain i am deaf" or something like that. It often works! Also like someone mentioned sometimes the person thinks we are solicitors or salespeople. We call back and explain and they say "ohhh I thought you were a telemarketer." But yeah... sometimes just saying "explain I am deaf" works, because regardless of your Deaf politics, it usually gets the point across! :-)

diehardbiker

Problem I often see is that most "employees" who works for companies, they have what is called work performance. What it means that if a employee job is to take calls, boss "expects" this employee to take x number of calls per hour, with relay calls, it is almost impossible to meet that x number. That is the problem. These TTY relay calls takes forever to complete a call! That is why I believe VRS known as Video Relay service is best way to deal with this. I rarely get hang up with VRS, but got hanged up very often with TRS! This is a proof! I have done experiement and it proves that TTY takes forever to complete single call. In other word average call is 4 minutes for hearing person comparing to 50 minutes for TTY calls. so, meaning having only 1 call in an hour looks bad for employees, so employee rather lose that relay call to save their performance.

There is no way we can really win this case, sue them has no merit because your sue to "Generic" and there is no way we can gain control.

Best is to educate and use VRS!

shel90

Wow..I didn't know that! thanks for sharing this tip.

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GraysonPeddie

VRS = Learn Sign Language

Sorry! I can only do IP relay...

I can't wait to sign up fo an IP CapTel (Captioned Telephone) service for my Pocket PC Phone...

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lizzardhere

lizzardhere

ismi

Quite often, I will try to provide that sort of info, and be told by the oper that it's not their job to "handle the call for [me]". True enough, I suppose ... my solution is usually to just copy and paste those numbers in from notepad.

As far as the feeling that we type too slow? I can tell you, some oprs' typing is pretty damn slow.

Seriously, if it's such a miserable job, why do you bother posting here?

diehardbiker

Question... anyone of you VRS users, calling hearing people and got hanged up?

I wouldn't be surprise the word "rare" will often be the answer! I rarely get hanged up though VRS, and I frequently got hanged up though the TRS or IP relay! BIG difference. That is why I try to use VRS as much as I can, it works almost every time.

DHB,

diehardbiker

Usually the typing speed is not the factor. Most of the time we type faster than TTY machine or baudot can handle so, when you type, and the end you will see lights remains on for few seconds after you finish typing, that is because the machine is catching up. No way can beat this limitation. These baudot can handle around 60 WPM, I won't be surprise many of you can exceed 60WPM easily.

ismi

Is IP relay also limited by this? (Not that it changes my point - there's a lot of variability from opr to opr, and often it's more along the lines of latency than throughput.)

diehardbiker