Phone Phobia

I have a terrible, terrible, irrational fear of the telephone. I can call close family- e.g. mom and sister- with not much of a problem. Calling family outside of that boundary is a little more difficult. Making appointments is not too awful, but still unenjoyable.

I have worked two jobs before where I had to answer the phone. Neither job involved many calls, so I was able to handle it somewhat. Jobs with heavy phone duty are a whole other story, which is why I lasted one day on a job with banking customer service. I simply could not do it.

Its not just a phobia. I don't hear well. And when I am on the phone, I cannot concentrate. The least little sound or distraction outside of the phone conversation blows everything. I lose hold of whatever the other person is saying and what the phone call is about and then I get aggravated, which only distracts me even more.

The other day in work, my boss comes in in her typical bitchy mood and hands me two files and tells me to call the firms and then she starts telling me all these things to ask and I am just looking at her like, are you fucking kidding me? I do not have the first clue of how the stupid company deals with appointment making. After getting upset, one of my coworkers offered to make the calls for me and allowed me to listen in while she made them. She asked questions I would have had absolutely no idea to even ask. She also had to use the computer system, which I have not been trained to use that part of the system so there is another area I would have had no idea on what to do. When my coworker got off the phone, she told me flat out that as I am someone not trained to do that, I would have had no idea on what to do because even she was getting confused. And she is VERY good with the phones. I learn quickly, sure, but I have to be taught first. My boss made some bitchy comment to my coworker that I have to learn some time. Yeah, well, I have to be given something to learn.

I told my boss when she asked me if I would be interested in working for the company that I would take basically any position provided there is little or no phone work involved. She said that would be no problem. Now all of a sudden, she is planning on not only making me take phone calls, but doing outbound calls and heavy customer service. And I am not doing that. I can take light to moderate phone traffic, but heavy phone traffic and heavy outbound calls....no way. Absolutely no way in hell can I do it.

I also don't like how my coworkers leave their password to the computer lying around. Seriously? If someone got into that building, those passwords can lead to a fucking universe of information. Medical ID theft at its finest. And people go around using other worker's passwords and login names. It does not sit right with me at all.