“Please hold — your call is important to us.” If you’ve ever heard that sentence then you know what it’s like to be “on hold” for customer service. Journalist and author Emily Yellin found herself suspended in customer service no-man’s-land when she tried to get her home warranty company to honor their commitments. The experience propelled her to explore the inner workings of the customer service industry, and to write a book about it entitled “Your Call Is (not that) Important to Us.” Yellin was a featured speaker at the 20th Annual Compete Through Service Symposium, hosted by the Center for Services Leadership at the W. P. Carey School of Business. She talked with us about the state of customer service today, and how companies might improve. Symposium podcast coverage was sponsored by IBM. (5:54)