this post was submitted on 07 May 2026
207 points (98.1% liked)

Technology

84920 readers
3619 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
L3s@lemmy.world
enu@lemmy.world
technopagan@lemmy.world
L4s@lemmy.world
L3s@hackingne.ws
207
AI ‘accent masking’ at overseas call centres sparks union backlash in Canada (globalnews.ca)
submitted 2 weeks ago by sanitation@lemmy.radio to c/technology@lemmy.world
20 comments fedilink hide all child comments
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] muusemuuse@sh.itjust.works 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

They intentionally add the background noise in.

[–] panda_abyss@lemmy.ca 15 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Do they? That makes me incredibly angry.

[–] vodka@feddit.org 16 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

Here's something more to annoy you:

The call system we have at work has an option for a "minimum queue time" So you can make sure that people always have to wait at least a certain amount of time, even with free agents.

[–] buffing_lecturer@leminal.space 9 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

Are you aware of the reason(s) for this? To discourage would be callers from following through?

[–] DisasterTransport@startrek.website 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I can think of a couple

  • expectation management: sometimes call volume is genuinely high, and if you set a floor at say 10 minutes it only feels like a 5 minute difference if the caller's actual wait time is 15
  • engineering downtime to allow agents time to complete paperwork or catch up on emails
  • make us all so annoyed with the process of waiting in line we welcome AI agents as liberators
[–] edgemaster72@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago

(My guess, best case scenario) Make queue times during non-busy hours more similar to the queue times during busy hours, so that there doesn't seem to be a "better" time of day to call, hopefully spreading the call volume throughout the day and creating a more consistent wait time when calling (even if that means the experience is worse than actually necessary at times).

At least that's probably how someone in management sold the idea.

[–] spizzat2@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 weeks ago

I'm sure it's to give you a sense of "pride and accomplishment" when you ~~give up and fix it yourself~~ "adopt digital self‑solve".

[–] myplacedk@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

If you can look it up yourself quickly, or just ask a person on the phone quickly, lots of people will call.

But if the phonecall is at least 15 minutes of listening to annoying my music first, looking it up yourself might seem like a better idea.

People who really need to talk to a person might be annoyed, but it won't make them consider a competitor.

[–] panda_abyss@lemmy.ca 8 points 2 weeks ago

Can we make arson legally allowable for these cases?