Hey

Are any of my avid blog readers noticing my background either not upload or take forever to load? It's happening to me all the time when I view my blog, not quite sure what the problem is. Anyhow let me know if you're experiencing it too.

I feel bad for Stephen, it's supposed to be 102 today and he's working this afternoon. A lot of the time he is outside. Poor guy.

So I just got done with a short shift taking calls for West. It's funny because when I pick up these afternoon shifts, it's usually elderly people calling either about medical insurance or diabetic meters, etc. So I took a few calls today placing orders for talking meters. I did however get this one caller who was very distraught about the commercial he just saw for Life Alert. He was upset with this product and started sharing his personal story with me - I would've felt rude to just cut him off and explain I do not actually work for this company, so I listened. He actually just lost his mother on May 20, she had something similar to this life alert but it didn't work and he feels gives false hope. She experienced a heart attack shortly after he served her breakfast and left for work. When he returned home he found her deceased, he cared to share in detail the color of her skin and that she was still holding her yogurt from that morning! I felt so sorry for this man's loss. I did finally explain I was not an employee of Life Alert and referred him to their company number so he could call or write them to share his anger about the FDA approving these products. It definitely is weird when I start talking with all these people from around the States and they start getting personal.

Well Madeline has her hip hop class this afternoon. I'm going to try and video some of it as they're learning a really cute routine!

Taking Calls

Many have been inquiring how my job with West is going...so I thought I'd give an update post. I really love the flexibility of this job. Although I would have to say people looking for full at home work wouldn't be getting the hours they want. Right now there's only a few shifts available, I'm usually scheduling myself about 2 hours a week. And then I check on certain days that I have down time if another agent is needing a shift picked up, and I'll work an extra half hour or hour.

I'm definitely comfortable on the phone now when talking to customers. I talk to people from all over the U.S. Today I took a call from a New Yorker with a pretty heavy accent! :-)

So the extra pocket money I've been making has been nice. I hope to be able to schedule more hours for myself in future months (I guess when business picks up). I'm also providing part time childcare for our neighbor's daughter now, so the income from that has been helpful as well.

Above is a photo of me during a shift taking calls. I've actually come accustomed to my phone headset and I even find myself using it while talking to family and friends, keeps my hands free to multi task while talking - moms always find a way to multi task! Stephen just laughs at me every time he sees me talking with them!

My first shift with West!

So I worked my first shift for West this evening! I picked up a shift another agent needed to get rid of. It was only a 1/2 hour shift but I thought it would be good practice. I actually got nervous, my stomach got in knots! My first caller was an elderly lady who had a hard time hearing, she was ordering "The Lifetime of Romance" Cd collection. I kept having to repeat myself to her and talk louder, thought surely I was going to wake the kids! My second call showed it was for a vacuum cleaner, but after I gave my greeting the caller hung up. My 3rd call was again for those Romance Cd's. This woman was nice although she was getting annoyed with all the upsell Cd's I had to offer (and read to her about), but the call ended well. The 2 calls took me a little over 40 minutes, but it went by fast! The only thing I disliked was having to give the upsells. And I know with Direct Response orders, it comes with all of them. So I'm going to get some time and experince in with it and then hope to train for a different company like Toys'R'Us or ProFlowers, where upselling isn't as present. Just thought I'd share my first part time work at home experience with y'all!