Clients often call disgruntled at the high turnover of staff. One cannot blame them. Their calls are answered by outsourced call centers that are the first line of offense in testing their patience. God knows these centers have deteriorated over time. Call banks are trafficked groups at a time according to their English proficiency. That is, how well they can assuage customers in Spanish while communicating with colleagues in English. The mastery of comprehension in either language is utterly absent.

To cut costs, we employ a cloud-based switchboard that comes with totally features but lacks the stability of a land line. Virtual assistants are eager to note how hard they “tried to call” clients with “no answer.” The more virtual assistants “try” to “help,” the worse communication becomes. In the end, clients feel how little they mean to the company. To avoid liability, the staff just “kicks the can” to others down the line. Although failure to connect a normal phone call is rare, “being disconnected” as a metaphor is too common.