Siane

I usually don’t even bother writing reviews, but this experience was so upsetting that I still can’t believe it happened.

Two days ago, I called ABN AMRO to assist two of my colleagues who are unable to speak English or Dutch. They’ve been waiting for over a month for their ATM PINs after opening bank accounts at ABN AMRO. We knew that account holders needed to be present for the call, so they made the effort to travel all the way to my office so I could help them contact the bank.

Of course, the system was down that day. One of them came again the following day, and I assisted him with calling ABN AMRO once more. The call was long, the verification process was slow, but thankfully, they managed to resend his PIN.

Then came the turn of my second colleague. She doesn’t speak English at all—not even basic numbers—as she’s here for diplomatic reasons. Today, I stayed on the line to support her. Right from the start, the customer service agent refused to speak to me and insisted on speaking with my colleague. I tried to help by spelling things out and guiding her through, but the agent told me I wasn’t allowed to do that. I explained clearly that my colleague doesn’t speak English, but the agent simply said we needed to “figure it out ourselves.”

So while we were trying to “figure it out ourselves” —the agent HUNG UP on us. She hadn’t even finished speaking.

I called again—pretty sure I got the same person. I even asked if we had just spoken, and she gave a vague response about how they handle many customers.

Still trying to remain calm, I let my colleague speak slowly and directly, while staying by her side. It was an incredibly long and difficult call, but we finally got through the verification.

Then, out of nowhere, the agent said we just need to apply for the PIN manually through the app. I told her that wasn’t what we did the day before, and that we had already tried using the app—but it didn’t work.

And then she said, “It’s just too much work.” I was so stunned. What do you mean, “too much work”? We're the one who's doing the verification process ourselves (through the ABN AMRO app).

Then she added, “It takes too much time.” Seriously? Why did I even bother calling if, after all that effort, you’re just going to push everything back onto us?

She spent all that time doing verification on someone who clearly doesn’t speak the language, and in the end, she refused to help and dumped the responsibility back on us.

I was left speechless. The lack of empathy, the dismissive attitude, the laziness—it was honestly the worst customer service experience I’ve ever had.

I was literally shaking after the call. Absolutely insane.

*Just for your reference, the call was today at 10:33 AM and 10:39 AM