It doesn't matter what company you call these days (or actually for some time already) the standard message you get is that due to unexpected high call volume your wait-time will be longer than usual.
There are several aspects of this statement which are mendacious, an outright lie. First, the call volume is not unexpected; it is standard. Second, the wait-time is not longer than usual; a long wait is the new usual.
But the boldest aspect of this mendacity is that the long waits that we are subjected to are the result of corporate decisions to not hire enough people in their call centers to handle the volume of calls efficiently, which is to say in a timely manner. They are more concerned with the impact of extra hires on the bottom line than they are the time of their customers.
This practice is beyond rude. Many companies do not even have the courtesy to tell you approximately what your wait-time will be, to enable you to make a decision whether the wait is worth your time. They think nothing of keeping you hanging.
A few companies, recognizing the inconvenience facing their customers, do provide you with an option to receive a call-back without losing your place in line. This is an excellent practice. Most however do not bother; they just don't care about their customers, protestations to the contrary notwithstanding.
In the old days, when companies dealt with mostly local customers, this problem would have been unheard of. That is what made Lily Tomlin's AT&T telephone operator character so funny — because she, being with a large national corporation, was so different in her attitude towards customers.
Now, not only is the volume of people huge, but technology has made us all more distant, our interactions more ephemeral. There is no there there anymore. And so we all suffer in countless ways, both large and small. Being put on endless hold is one of the small ways.
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