Call center jobs don’t just require special skills — they often require emotional armor.

So when one laid-off tech support worker took a new contract denying warranty claims, he got paired with a battle-hardened coworker who refused to bend for repeat complainers.

Soon, what felt like just another training day turned into a masterclass in saying “no.”

Coworker told a customer “No” in my favorite way

In the aughties, I worked in a call center doing tech support.

Our jobs ended up getting outsourced, and I got laid off.

A few weeks later, the company called and asked if I wanted to work on a new contract at the call center.

I was desperate for a job, so I went back.

It didn’t take long for her to realize this wasn’t a forever job.

The contract was doing warranty customer service for a major car manufacturer. Once training started, I realized quickly how much it would suck.

My previous job was to fix the caller’s problem, something I enjoyed.

With that warranty stuff, the caller was the problem and my job was to find any way to tell them ‘No.’

She found that some coworkers were better at saying no than others.

I was paired up with a battle-hardened older woman for a few hours to listen and learn.

She was an old hat at it, and I got to witness her power.

A guy called in, and she had a look at his call history.

Immediately, her coworker knew this guy was trouble.

She muted him and showed how this man had called in for stuff many times over the years despite his truck being long out of warranty.

He had somehow begged, whined, complained, and screamed his way into free repairs multiple times.

None of it should have been covered, but people just did it to get him off the phone.

At first, her coworker tried to reason with the guy.

She unmuted him and let him go on his spiel.

She told him three times that she could not help him, and he started getting wound up.

So then, she took a very different approach.

Finally, she gave a big sigh and said words I’ll never forget.

“Sir, there comes a time in every man’s life when he must stand on his own two feet. To take full responsibility for himself. Today, sir, is your day,” she said, as if she were giving a pep talk to a team before the big game.

Surprisingly, this actually seemed to work.

After some silence, he simply said “Okay” and hung up.

She made some notes and told me, “He’ll probably call back,” and went on a smoke break.

This employee didn’t last long, but she never forgot her coworker’s words.

I didn’t last a month at it.

It was too soul-crushing for me.

I often wished I could channel that woman’s energy and tell someone off in such a well-worded way.

A seasoned customer service employee can be a force of nature.

What did Reddit have to say?

This customer really needed to be told off, and this woman found a way to do it gently.

This commenter shares another clever line they learned from their boss.

This commenter added a new word to their vocabulary.

When you spend too long on lost-cause customers, other work tends to pile up.

The caller got told “no” in the most polite way possible, and the trainee got a front-row seat to customer service greatness.

At call center jobs, you either grow a spine or you burn out.

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