This woman is smiling because she just got rid of another confused mobile owner. Already we know that many people don't even know which mobile they own, which makes it no surprise that they can't use them properly either. According to new data on US customers from JD Power and Associates, 59% of mobile customers called their operator's help line in the previous 12 months, the highest figure since JD Power started gathering this data. The company pointed to new applications such as cameras, MP3 functions and ringtones as being the cause of many confused calls to customer service lines, and said that, not surprisingly, hold times for these calls were rising as well.

Most people called (74%), while some 22% actually braved the operators' stores to get serviced. Only 4% used e-mail or other online channels. None of this is good news for operators as JD Power pointed out that customers who had to call a help line were 50% more likely to switch carriers on average. Which is not such a great idea since they will end up in exactly the same situation somewhere else.

Who is to blame? Operators, mobile vendors, incapable users?