Defeat Telephone Robots by Playing Dumb
Usually, when I get to the point of picking up the phone to call a company, it’s because I’m dealing with a problem that no mere phone robot could possibly help me with. In many cases, pressing “0″ and/or “#” repeatedly or saying “agent” will connect you to a human, but that wasn’t working for me with Citibank today. So when I finally found my way to a person, I asked her if there was any sequence of numbers I could dial to talk directly to a live agent. She said, “sure, just don’t say anything or press any buttons for a while, and you’ll get connected to a person eventually”. When I called back, I actually had to start over because I responded to the prompts without thinking—it’s hard to play dead—but it works!