Named & Shamed
SOFTWARE WARNING!
HP’s 15-minute ‘on hold’ delay for callers
Keumars Afifi-Sabet puts the boot into tech villains, jargon-spouting companies and software trying to trick you
Andy Warhol is often credited with predicting that “in the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes”. He would have been just as prophetic claiming that “in the future everyone phoning HP’s customer services will have to hold for 15 minutes”.
That’s the length of time HP added to all phone calls from customers to deter them from phoning the company. According to an internal memo leaked to The Register website, HP wanted to encourage customers to “self-solve” their problems instead by looking for help on its website.