Thursday, March 19, 2015

Intake Call From Hell

When you are your own receptionist, like a lot of self-employed massage therapists are, you get a lot of phone calls.  Some of them are asking for basic information about massage, some requesting prices and hours of operation, some trying to sell us something, and then.... there are calls like this one.

I answered the phone by announcing my business name, then I gave my name and asked the caller what I could help her with.  In a very upbeat manner my caller started telling me all about herself.  During the next SEVENTEEN frickin' minutes I found out that she was 60 years old, that her father was deceased and his passing marked the first time she had a colonoscopy.  She told me her mother was 92 and bitter--but in otherwise good health.  She told me all about how she watched her father take such abuse from "the church and its so called Christians" where he was the minister FOR YEARS.  (The last two words of her sentence were over-emphasized for the high drama factor.)  She told me she was "thinkin' on going to the Healing Arts 'cause she is interested in trainin'.  She then segued into telling me about her car wreck and stated that she had not driven since her accident and that was THREE YEARS AGO!  (She yelled this with such vigor and pride.) And then the conversation turned to her reading aloud an article about lymphatic drainage....which she stumbled over, mispronouncing most of the content.  The caller then asked me to explain what lymphatic drainage was.  Soooooo after my mini lecture on what LYM-PHA-TIC DRAIN-AGE (I yelled this at her phonetically) actually was, she says "You don't really use something to drain that out of a body, do you?"  It was at this point I was truly irked enough to interrupt her.  I said "You know, I hate to interrupt you but you still have not told me why you called me today and I have clients to see, so tell me why you called."  There was a lengthy pregnant pause and then in a less than enthusiastic tone she said "I guess how much do you charge for a massage?"  So I tell her the rate for a 60-minute massage as I knew if she booked an appointment with me that I could suffer through an hour with her --but not one stinking second longer.  The phone line disconnected.  So after listening (mostly) patiently for 17 minutes the only thing I did not find out was the real reason she called me.

The lesson from this story is to take control of the conversation or suffer the consequences.