Chapter 24: The Grueling Grind of Customer Service

The days after starting work seemed to accelerate, blurring into one another. In the blink of an eye, Zhou Ruoyu had worked straight through to Friday, utterly exhausted and devoid of spirit.

How could one possibly describe the young woman’s experience in customer service these past few days?

Perhaps “seeing black” was the most fitting description.

Ahem…

Zhou Ruoyu, in truth, was far from lazy. After all, Longyu’s boss had offered her such a generous base salary; doing nothing would undoubtedly leave her with a sense of indebtedness.

Nor was the company’s system overly complex; on the contrary, the long-haired young woman had easily grasped its intricacies, operating it with surprising proficiency.

The sole issue, however, was…

The actual content of the work!

It was truly outrageous!

This wasn’t customer service at all!

No, perhaps more accurately, it was nothing like the customer service she had envisioned.

What had Zhou Ruoyu originally imagined? Quite simply, customer service meant receiving user inquiries and, following established procedures, providing assistance and answers. It was akin to a human index.

After all, customer service representatives weren’t omniscient; they relied on the company’s reference manuals to provide information. So, customers would ask, and she would find the answers in the materials, then relay them.

If that were the case, this job would have been incredibly easy for Zhou Ruoyu. It required little thought, and her tasks revolved around responding to others’ questions. She merely needed to wait to assist, much like a receptionist.

If the number of calls was low, she might even enjoy some leisure.

But…

The problem lay precisely in that leisure. Indeed, if there were few inquiries, customer service wouldn’t require many people. Even if there were many, there would be no need to hire so many.

After all, providing consultation services itself was not charged. Hiring more people would clearly be a money sink, with outflows but no inflows.

Yet, Longyu’s customer service department was unusually large. Why was this?

The answer was… naturally, they had launched a new business venture!

To make the customer service department profitable, these devilish leaders had truly racked their brains. Only after getting her hands on the actual work did Zhou Ruoyu realize that her tasks were nothing like what she had imagined!

She wasn’t responsible for general user inquiries at all. The Ninth Group’s true responsibility wasn’t the lofty “player community communication” that Department Head Gao Lan spoke of.

Or rather, that was merely a pleasant-sounding euphemism. Zhou Ruoyu could easily describe it with a more straightforward term:

The Ten-Year Veteran Recall Campaign!

In essence, it involved calling, one by one, old players who had spent significant sums in Longyu’s online and browser games but had long been inactive for various reasons. They would inquire why they stopped playing, then inform them about new version updates, and the rewards for returning and topping up a certain amount.

It was incredibly… down-to-earth, primarily focused on clear objectives and sincere attitudes.

Initially, after observing her colleagues’ work for the first time, Zhou Ruoyu felt nothing but a cascade of sweat. Later, she reconsidered, thinking, ‘Well, perhaps it’s fine.’

Fortunately, Longyu was a large company. While their methods bordered on harassment, at least they didn’t make her engage in online romance scams with old players, only to later reveal a grandfather selling tea.

However, one could only say… the good was limited.

What Zhou Ruoyu found most unbearable was Gao Lan’s deception! On one hand, Gao Lan claimed to arrange an easy position for her as a newcomer, yet on the other, assigned her a task that required actively calling and harassing people.

In reality, this job bore little resemblance to customer service; instead, it felt more like… telemarketing, or even purely a sales position.

The black-haired young woman was incredibly exasperated by this job, but she had no choice. The pressure of sales performance loomed over her.

She could only begin her struggle, dialing the numbers of long-AFK old players from the database one by one. The attitude of those who answered was, of course, predictable.

After all, most old players who had spent a lot of money and then abandoned the game held no goodwill towards gaming companies, especially one as notoriously pay-to-win as Longyu.

When Zhou Ruoyu proactively called, she usually couldn’t get through. Occasionally, a few would answer, only to hang up silently the moment she introduced herself as customer service.

Others would simply curse at her, telling her to hang up. In a rare few instances, some were willing to listen. Regardless of whether they eventually returned to the game, Zhou Ruoyu had to tearfully express her gratitude.

Because… without making enough long-duration calls, Zhou Ruoyu couldn’t meet her performance targets. *Sob!*

Thus, the already socially anxious Zhou Ruoyu, subjected to call after call after call, found her work pressure skyrocketing. Especially after each scolding, she would feel a pang in her nose after hanging up, then secretly wipe away tears.

Raising the phone receiver became a form of torture for Zhou Ruoyu. Each time she dialed, her heart would leap into her throat. After several such days, finally, after another day of torment, as lunchtime approached, Zhou Ruoyu suddenly collapsed onto her desk, then wearily drifted off to sleep.

‘I don’t want to do this anymore! I don’t want to… Why do I feel like I’m more miserable than Xiangzi now… Is this the fate of customer service?’

Zhou Ruoyu took a deep breath. Instantly, drowsiness overwhelmed her. She was too tired to even think about lunch.

Just as she was about to sink into slumber, a blonde figure slowly approached her from behind. Observing Zhou Ruoyu asleep at her desk, Liu Ruyan’s brows furrowed sharply, then slowly twisted into a cold sneer.

Suddenly, she raised a folder containing a stack of papers high, then brought it down with a sharp thud on the back of Zhou Ruoyu’s head!

With a resounding “Dong—!”, the office, previously abuzz with lunchtime activity, fell silent. The air seemed to still. Colleagues around them held their breath, watching the scene unfold. Zhou Ruoyu, dazed from the impact, abruptly turned around, crying out in irritation:

“Who hit me?! Liu… Group Leader Liu? Why did you hit me?! What’s the meaning of this?”

“Hmph, you have the nerve to ask me why. Sleeping on your desk during working hours; I was merely waking you up!” Liu Ruyan sneered, crossing her arms, and spoke in a sharp, sarcastic tone.