GetHuman can wrangle long waits, hold music and reps for you – or show you the best way to do it yourself.

We all dread problems that send us to customer service. Phone calls drop while you’re navigating an endless maze of menu options, none of which seem to help. When you finally do reach a point where help only seems a push-button away, you’re left on hold. In the middle of the workday, that might mean a half hour wait with big businesses like Bank of America or Comcast—but if you have to wait until the end of your business day, you could be on the phone for a lot longer.

Even when you’re off hold and talking to an actual person, he or she may not be able to solve your problem. You may be directed to another department or phone number, escalated to a supervisor or told to wait for a call back. Even with that half hour—or more—on hold, your issue may take days or even weeks to resolve.

Enter GetHuman, a website and app for iOS and Android that’s been helping people find the fastest ways to reach real people at customer support for years now. The company offers the best numbers to call, the hours they’re open (and the option to email or text you a reminder when they open if they’re currently closed), the wait time, the quickest menu options to reach an actual person, and even the ability to have a GetHuman robot wait on hold for you, calling you when you’re connected—saving you the wait. These are all great features that can get you the help you need with the minimum of hassle, but you do still have to handle the talking (and at least some of the waiting) yourself.

Now, the GetHuman team has a solution for that too: for a fee, the company will make the call (and wait on hold) for you to solve your problem with very little effort required on your part. GetHuman will deal with a wide range of companies, including airlines, stores, cable companies, banks, the IRS and even social networks (both Facebook and Twitter can be difficult to get in touch with if you’re having certain types of account issues). All you have to do is give a clear description of your problem, and for $5 to $25—most problems seem to bill at $14, but you’ll have to submit yours to find out—GetHuman will handle the rest. The company has been giving the new service a trial run and has helped nearly 10,000 people resolve customer support problems—and it wants to help you next.

Is GetHuman’s new service worth it? That depends on just how frustrating it is to deal with customer support for your cable company or bank. While paying $5 (or $25!) for a problem you could fix yourself with just a phone call might seem excessive, you may want to consider what your time is worth. Is $5 worth skipping 30 frustrating minutes on the phone? Is $14 worth avoiding a week of calls and call backs to find someone to help solve your problem? If you put a dollar value of your time, you may find that it is.

By Elizabeth Harper for Techlicious.com