Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

You know, I feel a bit for the AOL guy - anyone who has ever worked in one of these mega call centres knows that tremendous pressure is put on staff for these things. "retention stats" are posted on big boards in front of all your peers so you know where you rank.

Call centres can be evil, evil places - I think his manager, and his manager's manager should be sacked for applying the kind of pressure that results in a call like this.

Great clip. And well said dag.

I'm surprised this actually made the news.

Really? I'm more surprised the bob-sledding hamster didn't make the news.

wow, so you're telling there are still people using AOL? jeez. thats crazy.

This is great, I can't belive it made it to the Today Show. However, I'd have to say "Vincet Ferarri" sounds like the most made up name ever.

oh jesus charlatantric that killed me

rest in peace.

I love the "it took him 15 minutes to talk to an actual person".

that's pretty good service in my part of the world.

Oh, it took me 30 minutes of that...and they still charged me a month after I cancelled.

It's not a problem with a specific person, it's how they train their employees on how to hard sell.

Wow, Vincent has got a lot more patience than I would have...

Check this out...

http://www.veoh.com/videoDetails.html?v=e87752eaRFy4Wj

Its an interview with Vincent.

I know a girl employed as a telemarketer. Its a sh*t job, and this guy is as well trained as they get. Not his fault that AOL trains them to do all they can to disuade the account-cancelers.

Vincent, You're an ass. I don't know how to make this any clearer...YOU ARE AN ASS.

Shame on you you media hog.

Hmm, I've worked at a call center (for DirecTV, 2 years) and I can say I would've gone along with the customer's wishes after he said he wasn't using the service any more. (I certainly would NOT have looked up usage info to contradict him.) I didn't really think much of John's attitude in the latter half of that call, either. It almost seemed to me that he was baiting Vincent. Anyway... nice video, thanks!

for the entire call, http://www.break.com/index/aolhell.html

Re: "Not his fault that AOL trains them to do all they can to disuade the account-cancelers."

No, but there reaches a point when enough is enough, and I kinda agree with Vincent in the whole rep-asking-to-speak-to-his-father thing... There is no reason to speak to anyone but the account holder in a cancel situation. Reps are trained to retain customers, yes. They are not trained to backtalk the customer.

HEy this is great!

Sad thing is.. I went through the same thing ages ago. The poor AOL saps on the phone probably have an electrode attached to some naughty bit to force them to try and retain users.

Reason for leaving AOL? It was my wifes service - I taught her how to actually use the internet and your services are not needed any more. Still took 15 minutes to get him to kill the account.

Boohoo to those who feel sorry for those in the call centers... they chose that job to do so they need to accept what comes along with it or quit.

Regarding the guy losing his job? Bummer but it wasn't personal - it was business. I woulda been dropping F bombs after I got his management on the line.

Regarding Vincent? Nice work on recording the call. These retention tactics suck.

Re: "These retention tactics suck." -- Check this out:

i don't know if this is real or not, but i thought i'd share
http://consumerist.com/consumer/exclusive/aol-retention-manual-uploaded-in-full-188310.php

apparently it's the AOL retention manual.

I had to wait just one more hour for restored powers. OK, here it goes . . .

*promote

Re-promoting this video to the front page as a VideoSift Classic. Originally published on Thursday 22nd June 2006 (promotion called by gold star member dotdude)

130 votes. Just tells you how much we hate AOL hahaha. It's like a trans-generation type of thing. Ever since the 90's, people hated AOL. Only good thing that came out of it was AIM.

*dead

The link to this video has been flagged as dead. Fix it within 7 days or it will be discarded (dead called by gold star member djsunkid)

Discarding this video. It was flagged as dead but not flagged undead within 7 days.

dupeof http://www.videosift.com/video/Cancelling-your-AOL-account