10 Customer Service Facts That Would Blow Your Mind

The world of customer service can be fun, stressful and sometimes crazy. Looking beyond boring statistics and reports, there are tons of interesting customer service facts and figures that would blow your mind. Here’s a list of fun customer service facts

#1. Longest Hold Time

In 2012 a customer was placed on hold for 5 hours, 40 minutes and one second by an Australian Airline (source: ABC News)

#2. Longest Customer Service Call

Zappos employee Steven Weinstein holds the record for the world’s longest customer service call at 10 hours, 43 minutes (Source: Business Insider)

3. First Money Back Guarantee

In 1868, J.R. Watkins created what is considered retail’s first money-back guarantee. Because customers were unfamiliar with him and his product, Watkins molded the bottles with a trial mark. Use the product down to — but not below — that mark, and Watkins would refund the full purchase price on his next visit. (Source: Zendesk)

4. Absurd Customer Complaints

A diner complained to the waiter that the Champagne recommended was not as “excellent” as suggested. Despite consuming all but a glass of the bottle, he insisted on a full refund. (Source: thedailyquickly)

5. I’ll Tell Your Mom

A customer once called the mother of Comcast CEO Brian Roberts to complain about the horrible things the company was doing (Source: Yahoo)

6. First Call Center

The earliest example of a call center in customer service history was The Birmingham Press and Mail in the UK. Which installed Private Automated Business Exchanges (PABX) to have rows of agents handling customer contacts (Source: callcenterhelper)

7. Most Responsive Twitter Account

The world record for the Most Responsive Brand On Twitter is currently held by Xbox. Xbox has over 12 backup support accounts and posts an average of about 5,000 Tweets a week with the @XboxSupport handle! (Source: Mashable)

8. First Dictionary Entry

The term “call center” was first published and recognized by the Oxford English Dictionary in 1983. (Source: Wikipedia)

9. You Don’t Have To Wait On Hold

There is a customer service website that waits on hold for customer service for you. You dial a customer service line, go through the message tree and hang up. Whenever a human rep is available, the service will call you right back. Check out lucyphone.com

10. Customer Service Tweets

Over a million people will view tweets about customer service this week. Roughly 80% of those tweets will be negative or critical in nature. (Source: Adweek)

Bonus

For the shortest hold time, contact customer service between 8 and 10 a.m or 11 p.m – 2 a.m. Pressure on the channels is significantly lower at these times as most people are fast asleep or just about to begin the day.

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