Hold Music

[Takemeaway]

Don't mind so much being on hold but why in 2020 is the music always such poor quality sound and so muffled?

[Tango13]

There's a company in Baldock, Hertfordshire called 'Floyd automatic tooling' and their on hold music is always Pink Floyd

[Tyre Smoke]

We've got Just Drive by Alistair Griffin as our hold music.

We run a taxi business. Always gets a "can you put me back on hold? I was enjoying that!"

[rastapasta]

Tango13 said:

There's a company in Baldock, Hertfordshire called 'Floyd automatic tooling' and their on hold music is always Pink Floyd

that would cost a fortune to License.

[HustleRussell]

Takemeaway said:

Don't mind so much being on hold but why in 2020 is the music always such poor quality sound and so muffled?

Yes, somebody explain.

Also I am sure that companies deliberately choose bad music to persuade the potential resource thief (customer) to simply give up on the attempt of contact and ideally the will to live so that they will never trouble the company again.

Also even music which could be considered appropriate is selected e.g the traditional classical music, no consideration is given to just how shrill and empty a piece with for example high frequency strings would sound when delivered through a rubbish phone speaker directly into the ear.

Edited by HustleRussell on Wednesday 6th May 13:40

[Plymo]

What bugs me, especially with long hold times, is when the music is interrupted with "Have you tried going online instead" and "Your call is irrelevant to us, please go away" messages - which makes it sound like someone has just picked up!

[Shakermaker]

Not quite the same but about 10 years ago, one of the guys that worked for us had something on his phone whereby when I used to call, it would simultaneously make the "ring ring" tone whilst playing the theme tune to the A team.

Never heard it since, hadn't heard it before. Any ideas?

[Stella Tortoise]

Shakermaker said:

Not quite the same but about 10 years ago, one of the guys that worked for us had something on his phone whereby when I used to call, it would simultaneously make the "ring ring" tone whilst playing the theme tune to the A team.

Never heard it since, hadn't heard it before. Any ideas?

I recall that, I think that it was a Vodaphone thing.

[Shakermaker]

Stella Tortoise said:

I recall that, I think that it was a Vodaphone thing.

Very possibly. I think it predates the widespread use of smartphones, I was in my old job at the time so 2008-10, but I don't recall it being something advertised in the way that custom ringtones or wallpapers were advertised

[Zarco]

Takemeaway said:

Don't mind so much being on hold but why in 2020 is the music always such poor quality sound and so muffled?

I've often wondered this. Sometimes it's incredibly distorted as well.

[captain_cynic]

Takemeaway said:

Don't mind so much being on hold but why in 2020 is the music always such poor quality sound and so muffled?

Audio compression.

In order to save bandwidth PBXs tend to use very aggressive compression on audio streams. Compression is cutting down the dynamic range of an audio signal, not just in volume but frequencies as the only frequencies they really worry about with phones are those of the human voice... And sometimes they don't even care about that.

So they use the crapiest recording, compressed to within an inch of its life.to save bandwidth.

You can get high quality audio but that means the company needs to spend more on a better PABX and a dedicated high bandwidth connection. Many companies do, piping through quality music or radio. Just not the cheap ones.

[Takemeaway]

captain_cynic said:

Audio compression.

In order to save bandwidth PBXs tend to use very aggressive compression on audio streams. Compression is cutting down the dynamic range of an audio signal, not just in volume but frequencies as the only frequencies they really worry about with phones are those of the human voice... And sometimes they don't even care about that.

So they use the crapiest recording, compressed to within an inch of its life.to save bandwidth.

You can get high quality audio but that means the company needs to spend more on a better PABX and a dedicated high bandwidth connection. Many companies do, piping through quality music or radio. Just not the cheap ones.

Thanks for explaining - poor state of affairs though... we’ve put a man on the moon but we can’t get the tech for good quality hold music

[Jonboy_t]

Stella Tortoise said:

Shakermaker said:

Not quite the same but about 10 years ago, one of the guys that worked for us had something on his phone whereby when I used to call, it would simultaneously make the "ring ring" tone whilst playing the theme tune to the A team.

Never heard it since, hadn't heard it before. Any ideas?

I recall that, I think that it was a Vodaphone thing.

T-Mobile! Think it was called CallerTunes or something. I used to work in Phones4U at the time it was around and, IIRC, we got commission for every time we sold one of them! Was a good idea, but confused the balls off people who didn’t know what was going on!

[Noesph]

Tango13 said:

There's a company in Baldock, Hertfordshire called 'Floyd automatic tooling' and their on hold music is always Pink Floyd

Ah ah! I know. There a really good supplier.

I wish FedEx would change the music on there system, it must the same bloody song for six years now......