I have been in contract with Microsoft Disability Helpline. (I post about it before but I not can't login to that account. This site is very complex).
The helpline said I wasn't able to record the call. So I have now contacted the disability complaints department and they have reviewed the situation and given this reply:
"Our standard policy prohibits customers from recording support calls. When/if customers indicate they will be recording the call (consent), agents are advised to tell the customer they do not give their permission to be recorded and to end the call if the customer continues with the recording."
Surely, this is discrimatory, they wouldn't stop you using a hear aid. I'm sick of finding no one take recording conversation as a disability aid. I'm considering taking legal action, can anyone give their opinion on this situation? And can anyone recommend a solicitor? Nothing has changed at all over the 20 years I've had a brain injury and nothing will ever change unless we stand up and sat the situation is unacceptable.
Written by
LobDam
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Wait till after the election and go to see your MP to get clarification. Until then just record your calls anyway. Who cares what these companies' policies are, they don't care about you.
I do normally. The reason I informed them was that their team were putting the phone down on me because they couldn't answer the question. It happened twice, so I though tell them I'm recording so they might just refer me to someone else, instead of disconnecting the call. It was a nightmare. Getting bad service is annoying, but bad service on a disability helpline just makes you want to give up.
Sounds like you are trying to get something else sorted out and you are using the disability thing as some kind of excuse to get them to listen to you. Is that right?
These were two separate issues. But I lost trust in them to even stay on the phone. It really effected me, the level of despair on trying to sort such simple issues. I even spoke with my nuro rehab about this. So when I came to need to speak to them again, I was trying to protect myself from having to deal with a disconnected call again. But instead of it protecting from the call being disconnected, it caused another problem, when they refused to allow me to record. So the second time I had to disconnect the call 🙈
It kind of sounds like some of the tangents I used to go on in the early years after my TBI. It's like trying to sort something out but the system somehow does not cater for you. Then it becomes a fight against them rather than getting the original issue sorted.
I found in the end that being really polite helped more than fighting and also that what I thought were issues were not really worth the bother to chase up. I also realized that getting other people to help was really good also.
There are periods yes, where you will be angry at a system not designed to accommodate you. It's justifed.
And... it doesn't get you anywhere. It's banging your head on the wall.
There are people who advocate and that is very fine and well if they are medically stable and at a point where they can do whatever in the time they can be 'on'.
I have found, like pinkV, being very polite usually helps a lot. A lot of people actually do want to help, they just get their back up because a lot of people get really impatient with them. So, often I will come right out and ask, "Hi, x" (hopefully they said their name) "I am really having a problem and am struggling with a disability, can you help me?"
The other thing that works, is if you have a local brain injury society or other helping agency, make an appointment with your case manager, or have the case manager on a zoom call with you when you call, and either tell the person you have a disability and you need help so you have a case manager with you to assist.
I have also found getting the case manager to ask can help. For example, I had to apply to a service who did shopping for seniors and disabled people, and when I called to ask the woman who answered said I was too young to qualify and hung up on me. (She didn't ask my age or why I was applying, just went by my voice.) At the time I had no idea how to get past that. My case manager sent them a fax with the society letter head on it, and I got a call from someone the next day asking for my information to sign me up.
I have also found that literally every form or application I had to do had no awareness of brain injury and didn't ask questions in a way that let me describe my situation. I found the people at the society did know. The question would say 'Which Tuesday is the blue moon" and they would say the answer should be "Martians sleep all day". At least, that is about as much sense as it made to me.
The other thing you can do is call back on another day when you are well rested, better rehearsed in what you want to say, and call in the morning before the people working are tired. Although it's also been said that phoning after lunch is good as people are in a better mood and more likely to say yes. Well, since you can call back more than once, you can try.
Some places where you have identified yourself do keep notes on your calls, so keep that in mind.
Ask yourself whether you have the energy to go to war, and what you have the energy to go to war over. It narrows it down very quickly.
You also have to be careful because if you get militant and start talking about duty to accommodate and legalistic things, the people who answer the phone may have been told to hang up because the higher ups don't want to make it worse. Yes, as soon as it sounds like you may take legal action you get the door slammed and you are on a different track. (Sometimes, sometimes they just write you off as a rude one.)
It's a stacked deck.
And, there are ways around it. To a point, anyway.
Keep it simple, conserve your energy. (Yes, not fair. They aren't going to change.)
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