answer:I don’t know what the record was, but it was extremely annoying, especially when I was doing it many times each day. I don’t think that these companies are too concerned about the customer service experience, their primary interest seems to be in cutting their costs. I’d posit that one reason they do that might be so that only the customers with the most critical issues will end up in the queue. There would be a certain level of drop off among the less motivated people If you do a search on the internet, you can find the ways to bypass the automation and get right to a live operator. Every company is different, but there is usually a way around it. I learned all about that when I worked for an IP Relay company that provided telephone communication for deaf or hard of hearing users.