I absolutely hate people using my name in conversation. As you say, it feels patronizing, and to me it also feels fake and manipulative, especially in the context of customer support.

It's interesting to me how much advice about communication involves using a person's name. Do most people like hearing their name dropped frequently in conversations with strangers or near-strangers? Or is this one of those weird unproven "truths of the business" that get repeated because they sound good rather than because there's hard data backing up their effectiveness?

(I am not saying no hard data exists; I've just never seen any and the anecdotes I've heard indicate the opposite, so I'm curious.)