More than one in five Americans will stay on hold with customer service INDEFINITELY, according to a new poll: 31% will only wait five minutes, 34% will wait up to 15 minutes before they hang up and 22% said they’ll stay on the phone “as long as [they] need to.” The remaining 13% said they REFUSE to wait on hold. They’ll either request a call back, or find another way to get in touch.
One in seven people also said they wish HOLD MUSIC wasn’t a thing. 15% of us would rather sit and stew in silence while we wait. The most popular type of hold music is classical with 20% of the vote. Country music and “rock or pop” tied for second . . . then hip hop.
Just over a quarter of us think that “listening to annoying music or repeated messages while on hold” is one of the most annoying things about customer service. AND, 80% of us have gotten so frustrated, we’ve either started SWEARING at a customer service rep, or broken down in tears.
