I hate automated phone systems. I loathe them. I never find them useful and always go straight to a real human as fast as possible, and then I tell that human how much I hate their phone system. The only thing worse than pushing the stupid buttons to navigate through an unhelpful menu is when the system requires you to speak to it.
Words cannot describe the burning hatred in my heart for systems that won't let me push buttons and instead make me speak nonsense loudly and clearly for everyone around me to hear. Is it really beyond comprehension that I don't want to yell out my personal information while I'm in public? Even aside from that, anyone talking to those stupid voice recognition systems sounds like an idiot.
After using these systems I'm always super pissed off and unreasonable when I finally do reach a human being.
"Please say 'yes' to continue."
Yes.
"I'm sorry, I did not understand you."
He's not kidding, I often here him grunting and yelling and I know it's a bot voice command system.
You know about www.GetHuman.com, right?
http://gethuman.com/us/
Michael,
when I wind up in a system like that, I simply say "help" or "operator" until either the system say "ok" or decides it doesn't know what I want, and...transfers me to an operator.
It's actually MUCH simpler than regular voicemail menus!