a) the person on the other end of the phone accuses of me of being condescending because I default to using phonetic alphabet whenever I have to spell something. Excuse me for wanting to save time by ensuring that we're both on the same letter, rather than mistaking Ms for Ns and Vs for Bs or whatever other mistakes our wildly different accents can cause.
b) whoever I'm speaking to simply cannot comprehend the use of phonetics. Isn't that basic call centre knowledge, recognising when a customer is using phonetics and using them yourself for the sake of clarity?
c) employees ignore what I'm saying because it's the "wrong alphabet". I get that I'm probably not using the alphabet taped to the side of their monitor, but is the NATO phonetic alphabet really that hard to understand?
d) someone gets grumpy at me for "time-wasting" when I ask for details on an advertised job and I decline contact details after finding out location and/or start time; trust me, it's just as much of a waste to give me the contact details for a job I cannot physically get to. There would be no "time wasting" at all if these "minor" details were actually included on the jobcentre advert in the first place.