Does anyone else have this many telephone lines to answer?

I work in a medium-size insurance company office. Recently, HR decided they wanted ALL phones answered instead of the calls going directly into voice mail, whether we work in that department or not. We agreed that having a receptionst answer all the main incoming calls is fine but having all of us answer calls for departments we don't work in or know anything about is counter-productive. I now have 15 ringing lines on my phone and the noise and distraction hinders my job performance. The callers get annoyed at times also when I keep telling them I don't work in that department but can have someone return their call or else they can leave a voice mail message. Does anyone else out there agree with me that answering phones like this is not beneficial?

I agree 100%. Not only would it slow down employees progress at work, but also I HATE calling somewhere that I cant be connected directly to the person I need to speak with. That's NOT a good idea.

obviously automated answering system sometimes annoyes callers. Looks like your company wants to improve that but they don't have plan to manage all incoming calls.
May be company need to update the phone system so it rings to specific extension/department only.

I have the solution! It's called an IVR or Interactive Voice Response. It can answer all of those lines for you.

http://www.handlethetruth.net

That's a bad idea. It would also slow down the work of the employees.

i absolutely agree that it is not beneficial. it will probably make your customer service rating go down. i know from experience that when people call they want to talk to who they need to talk to and not some "twit" who knows nothing about what they need. not that you are a twit... but they are thinking that when you can't help them. maybe you should write alternate ideas for how to handle the problem and submit it to hr.

Isn't that nuts? I used to work at a place that had the same directive. I sat across from someone who spaced out most of the time and because I took care of my customers efficiently, I had to take the 'space cadet's' calls - because I "wasn't doing anything." Grrrr...
I handled it by providing information that made a persuasive arguement that customers prefer "one to one" treatment based on a relationship developed with a single inside contact that knew their business, circumstances and market.
Check out the internet and you should be able to find supporting data. Don't be emotional, be factual and show them how it will impact the bottom line.