Over the past week, my husband and I have had similar experiences. We call to make an appointment or to check on a missing piece of information we need to make decisions and have to leave a message rather than speak to a human. Now, I get that employers in all different fields are short on employees, but do they realize how frustrating it is when a customer/consumer leaves an inquiry and it goes unanswered for days upon days upon weeks?
On one hand, I think that I might be too used to the almost instantaneous replies of texting and messaging, but on the other hand, if a person/business still uses a phone to communicate shouldn’t there be someone to answer said phone and reply to voicemail?
I am old enough to remember answering machines that were separate entities from hardwired landlines. My parents sold advertising, and our home was their “office.” As soon as we came home from being away for any length of time – a day, an afternoon, a couple of hours – the first thing that happened was someone raced to “check the machine” to see if there were any messages. Then one of my parents returned the call once they banished us from the dining room where the phone sat.
Okay, so before my rant goes on too long, I better make sure that I am not a culprit of this form of torture and “go check my machine.”
Rita DiCarne 
I am so where you are. I cannot stand talking to a recording, which half the time doesn’t understand my words because i didn’t speak the ones it was trained to understand. Or when you have to go through menu after menu so the recording will know the correct person to send you to. I heard a story on the radio a few days ago about how companies save ginormous amounts of money not hiring humans to be customer service. But I’ve also heard that call centers often hire people in Central or South American countries who had lived illegally in the U.S. for several years and then deported — they know U.S. culture. And they’re also paid a fraction of what they’d have been paid if the call center were actually located in the U.S.
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The outsourcing makes it more infuriating!
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I hear your complaint! These days it is very hard to find a human to respond to any needs via the phone. Emails often go unanswered as well. It is a difficult world as far as communication goes……I am not sure of the solution, but we need to come up with something
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