You have reached the service desk of Orange/France Telecom. If you are calling about a domestic phone, press “1.” If you are calling about a business line, press “2.” If you would like to speak to an agent who speaks English, press “JAMAIS” (Never.) You will not be charged for this call as long as you are calling from a phone for which you have a contract. All agents are busy right now. You may want to try to resolve your problem by using our “on-line assistance” service. Your call will be answered as soon as an agent becomes free. Please know that this call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes.
“Can you help me, please? We get a bill for telephone from France Telecom and another bill for internet from Orange but I thought that the two companies were together – that we would get one bill for telephone and internet.”
“If you want the two bills together, you need to tell us. Are you requesting that we combine the services?”
“Yes.”
“Fine. From now on, you will see that you will have one bill that will include both phone charges and internet charges.”
Three weeks later…
You have reached the service desk of Orange/France Telecom. If you are calling about a domestic phone, press “1.” If you are calling about a business line, press “2.” If you would like to speak to an agent who speaks English, press “526247 for JAMAIS” (Never.) You will not be charged for this call as long as you are calling from a phone for which you have a contract and we find your call interesting. All agents are busy right now. Your call will be answered as soon as an agent becomes free but, of course, all agents are at lunch and will not return until 14:00 hours. You can wait if you want but we suggest that you call back when we are busy. You may want to try to resolve your problem by using our “on-line assistance” service which is available 27/4 (27 minutes per day, four days per week – though we will never tell you which days). Please know that this call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes.
“Thank you for your assistance during my last call. I still have a question. You combined the billing format online—though you are still billing me separately for each service, of course--but the phone charges remain the same. I thought that the phone bill would be lower.”
“The only way to reduce the phone bill is to use the telephone-over-the-internet service. That way, you will be able to maintain your unlimited long distance calling but the cost will be part of your internet bill and you will be able to reduce your land line phone charges. Would you like me to change that on your service plan?”
“Yes.”
“Please use the instructions that came with your internet connection to add the phone to your internet service and thank you for using Orange/France Telecom.”
“Thanks.”
Three weeks later…
You have reached the service desk of Orange/France Telecom. You will not be charged for this call as long as you are calling from a phone for which you have a contract and we find your call interesting or not as stupid as your last call. If you are calling about a domestic phone, press “1.” If you are calling about a business line, press “2.” If you would like to speak to an agent who speaks English, press “526247 for JAMAIS” (Never.) All agents are busy right now. Your call will be answered as soon as an agent becomes free but, of course, all agents are at lunch and will not return until 14:00 hours. What did you think would happen when you called at 11:00 AM? It is, after all, lunch hour in Cairo. You can wait if you want but we suggest that you go online and use our online services. Our agents prefer online assistance especially when your computer problems relate to “failure to connect to the internet.” That usually delays your phone call by 30 to 45 minutes. Please know that this call may be recorded for our amusement .
“I need your help again. Friends have told us that they have called our phone but we have not answered (because we never heard the phone ring). I have followed all of the instructions on how to repair the service but end up not understanding the answers.”
“You are calling us from 04 90 ……. which is your land line. You should be using the phone number for the internet line.”
“I thought that by combining contracts, we would also combine phone numbers so that we could use either the internet line or the land line with the same phone connections. But your diagnostic shows that I use either a land line connection or an internet connection. Every time I use the internet connection, it interrupts internet service and it is at those times that friends report that they cannot call us.”
“Well, your friends can’t call you when you have your phone set up for internet calling and they are calling your land line phone number. You will have to ask your [so-called] friends to call on the new internet-based phone number. And furthermore, our records show that you don’t have any friends. Please know that when you use your land line for international calling you will have to pay for it at our usual long-distance rates.”
“We understand paying for long distance at the usual rates, we have seen our bill on-line uncombined so we also know that “usual” means “high” rates. What is the solution?”
“Buy another phone. Then you can have one phone that answers internet-based calls and the other that answers land line calls. Thank you for letting us at Orange/France Telecom serve you.”
“What number do I press to begin swearing in English? “
“Can you help me, please? We get a bill for telephone from France Telecom and another bill for internet from Orange but I thought that the two companies were together – that we would get one bill for telephone and internet.”
“If you want the two bills together, you need to tell us. Are you requesting that we combine the services?”
“Yes.”
“Fine. From now on, you will see that you will have one bill that will include both phone charges and internet charges.”
Three weeks later…
You have reached the service desk of Orange/France Telecom. If you are calling about a domestic phone, press “1.” If you are calling about a business line, press “2.” If you would like to speak to an agent who speaks English, press “526247 for JAMAIS” (Never.) You will not be charged for this call as long as you are calling from a phone for which you have a contract and we find your call interesting. All agents are busy right now. Your call will be answered as soon as an agent becomes free but, of course, all agents are at lunch and will not return until 14:00 hours. You can wait if you want but we suggest that you call back when we are busy. You may want to try to resolve your problem by using our “on-line assistance” service which is available 27/4 (27 minutes per day, four days per week – though we will never tell you which days). Please know that this call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes.
“Thank you for your assistance during my last call. I still have a question. You combined the billing format online—though you are still billing me separately for each service, of course--but the phone charges remain the same. I thought that the phone bill would be lower.”
“The only way to reduce the phone bill is to use the telephone-over-the-internet service. That way, you will be able to maintain your unlimited long distance calling but the cost will be part of your internet bill and you will be able to reduce your land line phone charges. Would you like me to change that on your service plan?”
“Yes.”
“Please use the instructions that came with your internet connection to add the phone to your internet service and thank you for using Orange/France Telecom.”
“Thanks.”
Three weeks later…
You have reached the service desk of Orange/France Telecom. You will not be charged for this call as long as you are calling from a phone for which you have a contract and we find your call interesting or not as stupid as your last call. If you are calling about a domestic phone, press “1.” If you are calling about a business line, press “2.” If you would like to speak to an agent who speaks English, press “526247 for JAMAIS” (Never.) All agents are busy right now. Your call will be answered as soon as an agent becomes free but, of course, all agents are at lunch and will not return until 14:00 hours. What did you think would happen when you called at 11:00 AM? It is, after all, lunch hour in Cairo. You can wait if you want but we suggest that you go online and use our online services. Our agents prefer online assistance especially when your computer problems relate to “failure to connect to the internet.” That usually delays your phone call by 30 to 45 minutes. Please know that this call may be recorded for our amusement .
“I need your help again. Friends have told us that they have called our phone but we have not answered (because we never heard the phone ring). I have followed all of the instructions on how to repair the service but end up not understanding the answers.”
“You are calling us from 04 90 ……. which is your land line. You should be using the phone number for the internet line.”
“I thought that by combining contracts, we would also combine phone numbers so that we could use either the internet line or the land line with the same phone connections. But your diagnostic shows that I use either a land line connection or an internet connection. Every time I use the internet connection, it interrupts internet service and it is at those times that friends report that they cannot call us.”
“Well, your friends can’t call you when you have your phone set up for internet calling and they are calling your land line phone number. You will have to ask your [so-called] friends to call on the new internet-based phone number. And furthermore, our records show that you don’t have any friends. Please know that when you use your land line for international calling you will have to pay for it at our usual long-distance rates.”
“We understand paying for long distance at the usual rates, we have seen our bill on-line uncombined so we also know that “usual” means “high” rates. What is the solution?”
“Buy another phone. Then you can have one phone that answers internet-based calls and the other that answers land line calls. Thank you for letting us at Orange/France Telecom serve you.”
“What number do I press to begin swearing in English? “
