Date: Thu, 18 Jan 90 08:24:18 EST
From: r.aminzade@lynx.northeastern.edu
Subject: Risks of Voicemail systems that expect a human at the other end
 
Last night my car had a dead battery (I left the lights on -- something that a
very simple piece of digital circuitry could have prevented, but I digress), so
I called AAA road service.  I noted that they had installed a new digital
routing system for phone calls. "If you are cancelling a service call press
1,if this is an inquiry about an existing service call, Press 2, if this is a
new service call, Press 3."  All well and good, except that when I finally
reached a real operator, she informed me that the towtruck would arrive "within
90 minutes."  In less than the proposed hour and a half I managed to beg jumper
cables off of an innocent passerby and get the car strarted, so I decided to
call AAA and cancel the service call.
 
I dialed, pressed 1 as instructed, and waited.  The reader should realize that
my car was illegally parked (this is Boston), running (I wasn't going to get
stuck with a dead battery again!), and had the keys in the ignition.  I was not
patient.  I waited about four minutes, then tried again.  Same result.  I was
now out of dimes, but I noticed that the AAA machine began its message with "we
will accept your collect call..." so I decided to call collect.
 
Surprise!  I discovered that New England Telephone had just installed _its_
digital system for collect calls.  It is quite sophisticated, using some kind
of voice recognition circuit.  The caller dials the usual 0-(phone number), and
then is asked "If you wish to make a collect call, press 1...If you wish to..."
Then the recording asks "please say your name."  The intended recipient of the
collect call then gets a call that begins "Will you accept a collect call from
<recording of caller stating his name>"
 
I knew what was coming, but I didn't want to miss this experience.  I gave my
name as something like "Russell, Goddammit!," and NETs machine began asking
AAAs machine if it would accept a collect call (which it had already, plain to
the human ear, said it _would_ accept) from "Russell Goddammitt!".  Ms. NET
(why are these always female voices?) kept telling Ms. AAA "I'm sorry, I don't
understand you, please answer yes or no," but Ms. AAA went blithely on with her
shpiel, instructing Ms. NET which buttons to push.
 
I stood at the phone (car still running...machines nattering away at each
other) wondering who could do this episode justice.  Kafka?  Orwell?  Groucho?
I was sure that one machine or the other would eventually give up and turned
things over to a human being, but, I finally decided to dial a human operator,
and subject the poor woman to a stream of abuse.  She connected me to AAA,
where I punched 3 (rather than the appropriate but obviously malfunctioning 1),
and subjected yet another underpaid clerk to my wrath.