As if calling a company and trying to navigate through their impossible-to-navigate phone tree isn’t bad enough, it drives me nuts when the first thing I hear coming from the other end of the line is…

Please listen carefully as our options have recently changed.

No they haven’t. They’re exactly the same as the last 50 times I called to complain about your terrible service/product/whatever. You’re just telling me that your options have changed to make sure I listen to every recorded word in your system.

Maybe you want me to hear an advertisement for some new product of yours that I don’t want. Maybe you want me to get so annoyed with being forced to listen to your phone tree that I just hang up and don’t bother any of your representatives. Or maybe you just want to pretend like your options have changed so I don’t just start mashing buttons in hopes of reaching a real person instead of dealing with your stupid recording.

It doesn’t really matter what your reason for putting this “our options have recently changed” message is because it’s ALWAYS there. It’s about as helpful as having a Walmart greeter tell you as you enter the store, “Please browse carefully as our inventory has recently changed.”

By having this message always play, it essentially means nothing. You might as well just have it say, “Our options changed at some point over the last decade but we’re not going to tell you when. Most likely you’ve already heard our most recent options but go ahead and waste your time by listening to them again. It doesn’t really matter because once you find the option you’re looking for, we’re just going to ‘accidentally’ hang up on you anyway.“