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Yes, please. And off we go once again through the verification of my vital stats, along with
the reading of all the standard disclaimers. Arrivederci.
A week later my bimonthly bill from Telecom Italia arrives in the mail. It includes a 450
Euro lineitem charge for satellite services that is billed as a prepayment for next year's ba-
sic charges. Since the service costs 14.95 Euro per month, I'm at a loss to figure out how
14.95 times 12 has turned into 450. In any case, I've cancelled the service twice now, so
why are they pre-billing me for next year?
I'm back on the phone with Telecom Italia. The jazzy Frank Sinatra rendition of a few bars
from “Love You Just The Way You Are” greets you when you first dial in, and it repeats
while they tell you that you could've just used their website for the following services, re-
peats while you're waiting on hold, repeats while they thank you for your patience and re-
mind you about their website, and repeats whenever they transfer you. At first it's mildly
annoying; eventually you come to positively loathe it and cringe when you hear it.
When it's my turn to speak with a service rep from the billing department, I ask that the
preposterous charge for 450 Euro be removed from my bill. She explains that it's a prepay-
ment charge for my satellite service for next year. I say I cancelled the service. She says it
shows that I'm still subscribed. I ask how 15 Euro per month for 12 months turned into 450
Euro. She hangs up on me.
The first time that a customer service rep in Italy hangs up on you, it's a shocker. You con-
sider whether it could've been as accidental disconnect. After it happens to you multiple
times, you know there's nothing accidental about it. Sometimes they hear you speaking
with a foreign accent, and they hang up right off the bat. But more often it happens after
you present your issue, and they offer a facile explanation to get rid of you. You begin to
say,“Yes,but…”whenyousuddenlyhearthedialtoneandrealizethatyou'vebeenflushed
down the tubes.
You have to understand that Italians derive a goodly part of their sense of well-being from
spontaneous human contact and from having some liberty of movement. When they are
stuck in something like a post office job, they wither and get grouchy. When they are stuck
in a cubicle talking to voices on a phone, they just get mean, meaner than a junkyard dog.
They hate what they're doing, and they want to share the pain.
Back in the phone queue, Frank reminds me that there's no use changing—he loves me just
the way I am, and Telecom Italia reminds me about their website where presumably I could
avoid such extreme suffering and frustration. But I'm skeptical so I stay on the line for a
human.
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