In this dangerous, modern and ever changing world in which we live in (thanks Paul), there are a myriad of situations that can both confuse and annoy us. These can be simple issues such as the weather, noisy neighbours and goats in your washing machine. However they can be complicated wider ranging problems such as failing public services, nationwide riots or the internet being covered in Shreddies (mmmmmmmmm, Shreddies).
It's good to know however that there are a new breed of super heroes working to allay our fears and bring order to our hectic lives. These people are often maligned and ridiculed and condemned to spend their days in office purgatory. To you and I these people are customer service staff. They often deal with pleasant customers who are pleased with their chosen service and consider kindness to be a virtue.
However there are a plethora of customers whose main role in life is to torture, abuse and on some occasions send exploding yoghurts in the post. They seek out customer service staff like predators in the wild and launch wave after wave of nonsensical tirades at their chosen targets.
In the spring of 1986 the British government decided to honour the hard working customer service staff. They proclaimed 19th May thereafter to be St Forsyth's Day. This was named after Brucington Forsyth who established the first ever customer service call centre in 1389.
This was done in response to the most evil complaint ever made and one which until now remained confidential to the British public.
In February 1982 a mild mannered customer service worker by the name of Jesby Johnson was working at the REMIND (Reporting Escaped Monkeys In North Devon) call centre. At 09:48 approximately he took a call from a Mr Lennie Wilson-Tuft. Mr Wilson-Tuft was seething. He woke up that morning to find a chimpanzee had came in through the bathroom window and proceeded to take photographs of his wife ironing his golf balls. Jesby Johnson proceeded to inform Mr Wilson-Tuft that he had contacted the wrong call centre. Jesby stated that in fact he should have called RECLAIMED (Reporting Escaped Chimpanzees and Lost Apes In Mid-East Devon. Mr Wilson-Tuft was perturbed to say the least. He explained that he'd been kept in a queue for 4 seconds and he had previously tried to enter his details on the REMIND website (which would not be set up for another 24 years). Upon discovering this obvious lie by Mr Wilson-Tuft, Jesby gave him the telephone number for RECLAIMED and said there was nothing else he could do. Mr Wilson-Tuft responded by squirting strawberry jam down the phone line which completely flooded the REMIND call centre. This caused £909 worth of damage and made 3 staff redundant.
Mr Wilson-Tuft was arrested and charged with criminal jamage and sentenced to 83 years in prison.
This episode proves the point that customer service staff are not given the praise they often deserve, especially in call centres (not necessarily those that deal with misplaced primates).
*If you know of anyone possibly involved with this incident or you know the whereabouts of the missing chimpanzee, don't do anything beacuse it is all sorted now.
