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WSJ answers top 10 customer service pet peeves

To The Satellite Sisters who entertained me quite a bit this afternoon as they discussed the Wall Street Journal's article today called Pet Peeves in Customer Service. Of course my pet peeve is that the WSJ is subscription-based and unless you pay, you can't read the article.

The article provides explanations these  customer service situations that can create meltdowns of enormous proportion.

1. When you call a customer-service line, an automated voice often asks you to punch in your account information. So why does the live operator ask you for that information all over again?

2. Why can't stores ever deliver an appliance or piece of furniture when they say they will? And why do I have to sit around all day waiting for them to show up?

3. Why are public-address systems frequently inaudible? This isn't just a problem with antiquated speakers in subway stations. Brand-new sound systems in airports and other transportation hubs can also be impossible to hear.

4. Why can't you buy a non proprietary cellphone and use it with any carrier, the way you can do with a land line?

 

5. How come banks immediately take money out of your account for debit- card transactions, but when it comes to depositing money it can take as long as five days for a check to clear and be posted to your account?

6. Why do you have to pay for incoming and out- going minutes on cellphones? Essentially, a cellphone carrier is collecting twice for one call -- from the caller and from the person receiving the call. Shouldn't only outgoing calls cost money?

 

7. Why do rental-car companies charge so much money to put gas in the tank, forcing travelers to drive around near airports looking for a normal gas station so they don't get gouged? Also, why is rental-car insurance so confusing? You already have insurance through your credit- card company or your own auto insurer, so why do they try to sell you double coverage?

8. If companies are allowed to sell personal information about you to third-party marketers, even without your consent, why can't you just sell your own information directly to marketers?

9. Why is mobile directory assistance so unreliable? It seems that when you call from your cellphone, they can never find the number you need.

10. Why are items in hotel minibars so expensive? Do candy bars and bottles of water really have to cost $5? While we're at it, why do cheap and midprice hotels often provide wireless access free, while expensive hotels charge for it?

 

On the radio, The Satellite Sisters focused most of their discussion about the inability to get a correct number from  directory assistance.

WSJ's explanation is that there are too many database's around. However, a former directory assistance operator said that the problem was two fold. First, she agreed there are some very bad databases out there and some have numbers that are three years old. In addition, the phone companies put a lot of pressure on the directory assistance operators to handle the call in a certain amount of time. According to this former directory assistance operator, if they can't find the number you want immediately, they're not going to try any harder because it will look bad on their record.

Here's the thing. Even though I read the explanations, it didn't make me feel any better. I still hate going through all the levels of an automated voice mail system and all the reasons in the world won't change that.

AOL'S Little Black Book

When AOL fired " John", a customer service rep  caught on tape  making it very hard for Vincent Ferrari to close his account, there were some of us who said, "John shouldn't have been fired, he was doing his job."

Turns out The Consumerist, now has evidence that the former AOL employee was indeed just following company policy. You can now read the complete AOL Retention Manual for Yourself.

   "A plain manila envelope arrived on our desk this week. Inside was the eighty-one paged "Enhanced Sales Training for AOL Retention Consultants" manual. Upon opening, the flowchart, "Guide to a World-Class Retention Call," fell out.

One thing quickly becomes evident after reading the pages of tips and tactics. Callers are viewed not as customers, but prospects. Under the heading, "Think of Cancellation Calls as Sales Leads," the manual reads...

 

From the Manual....

"If you stop and think about it, every Member that calls in to cancel their account is a hot lead. Most other sales jobs require you to create your own leads, but in the Retention Queue the leads come to you! Be eager to take more calls, get more leads and close more sales. More leads means more selling opportunities for you and cost savings for AOL."

Meanwhile according to Reuters, New York Attorney General Elliot Spitzer is not amused.

"Last year, Spitzer investigated AOL's customer services policies and how it paid service representatives after about 300 New Yorkers complained about how difficult it was to cancel. AOL, a unit of Time Warner Inc. (TWX.N: Quote, Profile, Research), in August agreed to reform its procedures, provide fee refunds and pay New York $1.25 million in penalties and costs.

Yet AOL may not be out of the woods. On June 28, lawyers from Spitzer's office sent a letter to AOL demanding more information about its customer service and is seeking a meeting with its executives."

Famous last words: "We'll get back to you"

  In January 2005, Chloe took her teenage daughter to the eye department of a major department store to buy a new pair of glasses. There was no way that she could know that the transaction would  become her "own Kafka moment" and change forever how she feels about a respected department store, her insurance company, and consumer rights.

Since her health insurance picked up a portion of the cost of eyeglasses, Chloe innocently asked the clerk to call the insurance company to find out what amount they would cover. She waited while the clerk found out that information and then immediately paid the balance.

As Chloe says, " I have a superior credit rating. I pay my bills on time, I don't carry a credit on my credit cards. My husband and I are good money managers."

That's why she was surprised, when two or three months later she received a bill for the eyeglasses.And thus began the insanity of the bill that just wouldn't go away--even though Chloe had already paid for the glasses.

Being a rational human being, Chloe thought that a call to the vision department would clear up the confusion. It was not to be. " Every time I called the person answering the phone would say, " You have to talk to the manager."

Chloe called again. And again. And again. Finally after several weeks she managed to talk to the manager person to person.

It was not a great conversation. " She said she would have to do some research and she would get back to me."

When the manager finally did get back to her, she quoted a different payment arrangement than the insurance company had quoted on that day back in January. Chloe had now called the vision center about 10 times. Their final response, " You'll have to call the insurance company."

When Chloe called the insurance company they read to her directly from their CRM ( customer information service)  quoting what they ( the insurance company) had paid the vision center  and when they had paid the vision center.

Did I mention that Chloe is an executive who manages a multi million dollar budget and is used to working with invoices? Of course the numbers the insurance company quoted Chloe did not match the numbers that the vision center had on Chloe's bill.

Eventually, out of frustration, Chloe  decided it was time to write a letter to the store's customer service department.However, when she tried to look up that address, it was no where to be found. "I called the main number of the department store and no one there could give me that information either."

Chloe decided to send her letter to the president's office. In that letter explaining the entire situation. "I told them I was willing to pay any remaining balance but I needed to understand exactly what I owed and why I owed it."

Turns out that office couldn't help her but they gave her an address and phone number of the department to contact. Chloe once again sent the letter.

Once again she heard nothing. She called. Their response, " We never got the letter."

"No problem, " said Chloe, " I'll send it again.

"Before I got the letter in the mail, they called" said Chloe.  " They  said they had suddenly found my letter."
Not surprisingly, they said " We'll get back to you."

After several weeks, Chloe contacted them. She was delighted when they said, " We've got good news. We've got it resolved."

Chloe, relieved, said, " That's wonderful. I would like it in writing."

A week or so later Chloe gets the letter. It states, " Contact the Vision Center directly to resolve this issue."

It's now over a year. Chloe continues to get calls from the collection agency for $130.

Chloe says she's deflated. She wants to write the Better Business Bureau but says she doesn't have the energy.
Just to make matter worse, during the same time Chloe received a  different bill from her insurance company for $375 for surgery she did not have. After lots of calls back and forth, the insurance company said they had cleared the matter up and  she only owed a $10 co-pay.

A week or so ago, Chloe got a bill from her insurance company. For $375.
As to her daughter 's glasses. She lost them.

Note: Chloe is a pseudonym.

Image Credit: Flickr member Daily Pic

There you go again...Comcast Got It All Wrong

Last week AOL fired a customer service rep caught on audio for doing his job . A blogger had taped his conversation trying to cancel his  service.

The soundtrack became an online hit. This week's online sensation is the napping Comcast technician. If you happened to be watching Cable News this weekend, this video got a lot of coverage. But it was the wrong coverage.

They focused on the fact that Comcast fired the poor technician, who after waiting on hold for an excruciating and obviously mind numbing 90 minutes to his own office,took a nap. The technician napping, wasn't the issue.

Comcast's horrible customer service was supposed to be the butt of the joke. Unfortuneately, Comcast's knee jerk reaction was to focus on the fact that the technician nodded off.

Who wouldn't fall asleep after 90 minutes on a  Cozy Couch?

The Comcast technician didn't deserve to get fired any more than John at AOL deserved his firing earlier this month. What he deserved was a Gift card to Starbucks.

A couple of weeks ago,I encountered the working conditions of a Comcast technician. I had offered to greet the Comcast technician at my friend Myrna's house while she visited her dad in the hospital. He was working in her bedroom. I was downstairs.

After 45 minutes I went in to check on his progress. There he was, sitting on the floor with the phone cradled in his neck..on hold with Comcast. At the time I found it amusing.While I was used to being put on hold for technical support as a customer, I had no idea that the internal folks were treated the same way.

What's with that? We chatted. He said he always was put on hold for long periods of time.It was just part of the job. The guy who posted the video--Brian Finkelstein(who created his blog Snakes On A Blog for the sole purpose of being invited to the premiere of Snakes on a Plane) wasn't upset with the technician. He was upset with Comcast. That message got lost in the humor of the napping technician video. As he said on his blog,Snakes on a Blog,

At one point Comcast sent a technician to replace my cable modem/wireless router. This should have taken five minutes. Instead, when he called Comcast to activate my new modem, he was placed on hold for nearly 90 minutes. When I asked him why he was on hold for so long, he told me that phone reps were busy filling out customer service surveys. Then he fell asleep on my couch. I could have made a few suggestions for their survey. Anyway, after they missed two appointments in the last 24 hours, I’ve finally lost all hope of Comcast actually getting my internet connection working. To commemorate my miserable experience, I made this video (including footage of the technician asleep on my couch)

As expected, Comcast fixed the problem. Turns ot it was quite complicated and took at team over 5 hours to finally get his interent working. Jim Durbin, at Brandstorming also thinks that Comcast missed the point recommending that if they had had a blog they could have alleviated the bad press.

1) Link to the video from the Comcast blog. Comcast screwed up, and admitting it is the first step to take. Link the video, admit how embarassing it is, and call up Brian to personally apologize. Give him six months worth of free service.
2) Work to correct the problem. The problem is not the poor tech. It's the fact that cable service is a mockery, and everyone from sitcoms to comedians to average customers make fun of the service of cable guys. They even made a movie about it!
3) Don't fire the tech. Make him into a commercial where he drinks a lot of coffee. Turn this around. Use the guy as an example of how they are improving.
4) Highlight your successes by tracking progress. Highlight your successes. Make your improvements public.
5) Focus on other positive ways you can use blog marketing.

There's another aspect to this story. Instead of punishing the technician for taking a nap , Comcast should be applauding him --at least that's the belief of Camille & Bill Anthony of The Napping Company who are tiredlessly (because they nap) campaigning to promote work- time napping. More on that at another time -- but their point is that napping increases productivity. I hope to have an interview with them later this week. So in addition to the Starbucks for a year card, I think Comcast should also become a sponsor of National Napping Day --which always falls on the Monday after Daylight Savings starts.

Meanwhile, Comcast and AOL should rethink their firings, apologize to the booted technicians and yes, apologize to their customers.

Hat tip to Church of the Customer for leading me to Brandstorming. This is cross-posted at Blogher

Note: In the original post I had incorrectly identified Jim Durbin as Frank Durbin. Franki Durbin is his wife. The error was correct on 6/30/06.

Notes From The Road- San Francisco

First Impressions .When you think of the impression that a group of Irish students have about  the place where they are working in America  for the summer, what would you hope their take-away would be ?

That we are fair? Hard-working? Welcoming?

At least for the students I met on the BART going from the San Francisco Airport into the city, their impression is this:
 

Costco sells caskets.

The Irish students are working as food samplers at Costco.  They were quick to tell me they were not working for Costco but in Costco.  We started chatting because they had noticed me on the transit platform asking another passenger whether I was in the right place for the train into San Francisco. They asked me where I was going ,double checked their map ,and  then advised me that I should get off two stops after them.

They have been in San Francisco three weeks.   They are living in Berkley for the summer,staying at a Frat house with 25 Irish Students and a handful of Americans.They work Thurs-Sunday and each week  are sent to different Costco's to feature different food.While there is a lot that amazes them about the  Costco -- "It's so cheap and everything is in bulk,"The  thing that amazed them the most was the caskets.

Speaking to her compatriots, one of the four said in the freshest of fresh Irish Brogues,"Did you know you can buy caskets in Costco?"

They all acknowledged they were aware of this oddity and went into fits of laughter over the fact they were handing out food samples at a place where you can also shop for your casket.

They were also a bit impatient with Americans who tried to guess where they were from and either guessed Scotland or England. Their retort, " You Canadians are so funny."

Just moments before they started dissing Americans who couldn't tell an Irish brogue from a Scottish accent, I had fortunately guessed Irish , asking, " Are you from Ireland?" I made a mental note to self,"Don't guess about accents  anymore, you could be insulting someone without knowing it."

According to the students, Ireland doesn't have anything like a Costco. "We have supermarkets," explained one of the girls, but we have separate stores for food, tires, computers and  of course,caskets."

"So what food were you sampling today?"

I didn't get a chance to ask them if this All -American Snack food was popular in Ireland because they shared that after a day of handing out chips & salsa they never wanted to look at it again.

The conversation ended there. They got off the BART but they left me their map.

On another note today is the second anniversary of this blog. One of my earliest posts,Open -Toed Shoes is still the most popular, but Tattoo Lady is also a favorite.

To everyone who stops by, reads a post or two and shares some thoughts, thank you. I'm still having fun.

Credit Image: Flickr member cjanebuy

Did AOL's Customer Service Rep deserve to be fired?

Move over Coke Cola. After living with the dubious distinction as the most agrigous example of a company  self-imploding its own brand ( Think NEW COKE), it can now finally hand over the reign to AOL. As one person who commented on an anti-AOL blog said, "It's not 1995 anymore."

Unlike COKE ,whose undoing happened over a short, finite period of time, AOL is more like Al Pacino's character Sonny in the 1975 Classic, Dog Day Afternoon --holding innocent people hostage.

The latest AOL bru-ha-ha is over a former customer, one Vincent Ferrari ,who had the foresight to tape his call with the  unsuspecting John --an AOL customer service representative, as he tried to cancel his account. While the call may not get as many downloads as Connie Chung's "Thanks for the Memories," it is becoming an instant online hit.                                                       

For those of you who don't want to listen to the excruciating five minutes of Vinny pleading to have his account canceled, here is the gist of the conversation by way of Consumers Affairs.com

AOL: Hi, this is John at AOL. How may I help you today? Ferrari: I want to cancel my account.

AOL: OK. I mean, is there a problem with the software itself? Ferrari: No. I don't use it. I don't need it. I don't want it.

AOL: Last year, last month it was 545 hours of usage.

Ferrari: I don't know how to make it any clearer. So I'm just gonna say it one last time. Cancel the account.

AOL: Well, explain to me what is wrong.
Ferrari: I'm not explaining anything to you. Cancel the account. The conversation continued for another 5 minutes, ending with ...

Ferrari: Cancel my account. Cancel the account. Cancel the account.

In a not so surprising move the day after the news of the call hit the blogwaves, AOL announced it had fired our man,JOHN.

"At AOL, we have zero tolerance for customer care incidents like this -- which is deeply regrettable and also absolutely inexcusable," said AOL spokesman Nicholas Graham. "The employee in question violated our customer service guidelines and practices, and everything that AOL believes to be important in customer care," he said.

He then added,that AOL is

"going to learn from this -- and continue to make the necessary, positive changes to our practices. This was an aberration and a mistake, and we have to manage these incidents down to zero as best we can."

An Aberration? Not tolerate this behavior?  I would maintain that JOHN was just following company policy. And, that our man JOHN was simply doing the job he was paid to do. It's not as if AOL didn't just pay $1.25 million in fines for promoting just the behavior that JOHN demonstrated so gallantly in his call.
Firing JOHN is firing the messenger. JOHN didn't deserve to be fired.

It was less than 365 days ago that AOL agreed to the fine and promised the State of New York that it was reforming its bonus policy for customer service representatives.

Under the agreement, AOL will no longer require its customer service representatives to meet a minimum quota for customer retention in order to receive a bonus. Previously, AOL would distribute bonuses in the "tens of thousands of dollars" if representatives were able to retain half the customers who called to cancel their service, according to the attorney general.

While I don't know John personally, I'd love to hear his side of the story. I have a hunch he's singing like a jailbird to his attorneys.

Meanwhile, there are hundreds of thousands of people who still want to cancel their AOL. Last year, Utterly Boring shared a sure fire 3 minute solution to getting your AOL account canceled. The account was reported in the NY Times.

Guy tried for better part of a week to cancel AOL. He talked to six or seven different people on six different days. Each time he was thwarted by what is apparently an AOL plot that make it next-to-impossible to cancel the service, as the representatives pretend to be concerned about you and your reasons for cancellation and give you soothing chat and reasons to continue AOL service.

Finally, weary of the runaround, he went into a "chat room" and  started threatening to kill people in the room.

His AOL account was canceled in under three minutes.

Image credit: Flickr member huberjoshua

Something Special In The Air

It's a story they have probably heard thousands of times. A harried traveler asks to fly standby because its their mom's 81st birthday and they want a few extra hours.

When I picked my friend Nance up at the Minneapolis Airport, she apologized for her oversized suitcase. She is on a two -week jaunt with her husband Dan, who has business here for the next couple of days.

Earlier in the week they were in Philadelphia. Dan flew directly from Philadelphia to Minneapolis but Nance took a side trip through Chicago..so she could spend a few hours with her mom. When she made the reservations she was scheduled to arrive in Chicago late Wednesday night and then fly to Minneapolis early Thursday morning.(the goal here was to visit mom and still have an affordable ticket)

She then shared her extraordinary travel story.

Her first bit of luck was when she told the reservation agent that she would really love a few extra hours in Chicago to spend with her mom. The agent scheduled her flight out of Philadelphia so it would "force" Nance to stay over in Chicago. And, instead of making Nance leave Chicago on a 6:00 AM flight, the reservationist magically made it possible for Nance to leave in the afternoon --giving her the entire morning with mom.

The only catch was...Dan was leaving  Philadelphia early Wednesday morning and Nance's flight wasn't until the evening. That's when Dan suggested that Nance try to fly standby out of Philadelphia so she could arrive in Chicago even earlier in the day.

When Nance got to the ticket counter, she explained the situation. The reservation agent was not optimistic. The next flight was in 35 minutes, there were already four people on standby. In an act of faith, the agent took Nance's over-sized suitcase,put it on the flight with the 4 people waiting on standby and told her to run like the wind.

Nance did. When, hyperventilating, she got to the gate, the folks there were less than optimistic. As they told her, " it's a full flight." Then they called two of the standby folks. The rest of the plane boarded. There was a no-show. The fourth standby made it on the plane. That left Nance next in line for a seat.

At this point the folks at the gate asked Nance why she wanted to get on this particular flight so badly. When she told them it was her mother's 81st birthday, the folks at the gate said that if the last ticket holder didn't show up in 1 minute, they would close it down, and Nance would get on the flight.

About this time a frantic woman waving a ticket approaches the counter. Nance's heart sinks. As she mentally began preparing for a long wait in the Philadelphia airport, she overheard the counter folks telling the woman she was at the wrong gate.

They looked at Nance, smiled and printed out her ticket. Nance did have a middle seat on the flight  but she got to Chicago with plenty of time to see aunts, uncles and pick up pizza for mom's birthday.

What struck Nance about the entire episode is that everyone believed her and really had some heart in trying to make it possible for her to spend more time with her mom on her 81st birthday. What is surprising is that as ticket agents and gate agents they probably hear this story ( not always true) all the time.

So, how did they know she was telling the truth? Did they just choose to believe?  Or is it their culture  to act as if everyone is telling the truth and make them feel so taken care of?

For the record, it was Nance's mom's 81st birthday. She was absolutely telling the truth. It's wonderful when employees acts of kindness can create such a memorable birthday. It truly was "something special in the air."

University of Wisconsin gets a "D" On Graduation

From a purely business perspective it was a classic case of the business (The University of Wisconsin) being completely clueless regarding the needs and desires of their customers ( parents of graduates)

Parents have one expectation at graduation. When the announcer calls their child's name they expect to see that child shaking hands and receiving their diploma. Somehow it makes spending a $100,000 on tuition, room and board and in the case of Wisconsin, beer, a little more palatable.

The folks at the University of Wisconsin had a different vision of that day...lets keep this ceremony to two hours and call the graduate's names as fast as humanly possible. Instead of thinking about their customer, their focus was on time-management.

About six years ago I was hired by the higher edcuation division of PricewaterhouseCoopers to do a video on the state of higher education. It was  great project where I got to interview thought leaders at Harvard, Yale, MIT, University of Pennsylvania and Tufts University.

Of all the things discussed in that piece, it was the remarks of the president of Tufts University that have stayed with me all these years.

"Students," he said, " want to be treated as customers."

That message hasn't made its way to Madison. The complete lack of regard for their customer's needs-- the very simple act of syncronizing a child's name to the moment they receive their diploma was completely lost on the officials at the University of Wisconsin.

We didn't care what Chef Odessa Piper had to say.We didn't care about any of the speakers. We cared about our children and seeing them for 5 seconds receiving their diploma.

That was the only thing officials of the Uniersity of Wisconsin should have cared about. They failed.

The University of Wisconsin is a huge school. There are a lot of graduates. So many that there are two separate ceremonies for undergraduates.

We had the 2pm shift. For whatever reason, The University dispensed of doing things alphabetically.

Instead,as the student's make their way to the podium, they hand their name to the announcer. The way it's supposed to work is that as the announcer says the student's name, the parents, looking at the big screen used for watch sporting events, should see their child smiling, shaking hands and receiving their diploma.

Ah Best laid plans...

it didn't happen that way because the announcer didn't quite sync up with the hand shaking thing.

It was like watching Ashley Simpson trying to lipsync the wrong song.
So, as they called Noah Freed's name, he had already received his degree and was walking off the podium. His dad, who had the camera poised to snap at just the right minute--missed the Kodak moment.

Instead, a lovely young woman was shaking hands as they called Noah's name. I'm sure her parents were about as delighted as we were.

It's not good business for the people who write checks to feel robbed. As the  Associated Press reported, graduation is expensive.

"From cap and gown rentals to printed announcements to jacked-up hotel prices, pomp and circumstance doesn't come cheap these days. Some schools even charge explicit graduation fees of up to $160. While the joy of the moment often means families and students happily fork over the money, graduation weekend can wallop the wallet one last time...Still, multiply one family's graduation expenses - roughly $1,100 in Stout's case - by the hundreds of thousands of students graduating from college in the coming weeks, and you've got one very big business. Call it the instant nostalgia industry, and graduation season is its Christmas."

All I really have to say about the University of Wisconin's performance yesterday is Ba Humbug.

This is cross-posted at Blogher

A Tale of Two Restaurants: Au Bon Pain & The Good Earth

As anyone who studied the rivalry between McDonald's and Burger King will tell you, it's not the quality of the food that creates loyal customers: it's the experience. This is the tale of one customer, two  restaurants and how managers can either taint or enhance customer loyalty.

They did a bad, bad thing

For the past several years my cousin Paulette has met her daughter Michelle and grandson Erik at their local mall. As part of their weekly routine they go to the Au Bon Pain for coffee.

Every single Friday. At least 150  times Paulette, Michelle and Erik have gone to the very same Au Bon Pain.

On one particular Friday, Paulette left her "bag" at the table. When she returned five minutes later, it was gone. She contacted the manager, mall security. The police were called.

Paulette canceled her credit cards and based on the advise of the  police began the 'trash can search". As the police told her, purse snatchers often just take the money and dump the purse in the trash. Paulette went through every single trash can in the mall.

After she came up empty handed she decided to go back to Au Bon Pain --just in case. While she was there she went into the ladies room. As she washing her hands and getting ready to throw the paper towel into their trash can, she noticed something odd about the plastic bag lining the trash can. Sure enough, underneath the plastic bag were two Au Bon Pain bags  and in those bags were Paulette's purse. Everything was there. The cards. The cash. Everything. Nothing--not the lipstick. not her palm pilot. Not even a pen was missing.

Given the circumstances Paulette came to the conclusion that it was probably someone working at Au Bon Pain who had stashed the  purse underneath the trash bags until they got off work.

When she shared her theory with the manager, his response was,
"It couldn't possibly be anyone who works here."

Huh?  Paulette was astounded. She called corporate headquarters. They listened to the situation, said they would check into it. They never called her back.Paulette vowed to never go to an Au Bon Pain again.

She didn't for several months. But after awhile she missed her cup of jo and found herself once again going to the Au Bon Pain. Maybe that's what Au Bon Pain was counting on.

As far as their bottom line is concerned, they have their customer back.But sometimes you can't rely on the numbers. Paulette  is no longer a loyal customer. She is a disgruntled one.A customer who is very willing to tell her story whenever she has the opportunity.  If the mall had another place to get a good cup of coffee she would be there in a coffee bean minute.

They did a good good thing.

Paulette and Iwere having a late lunch at The Good Earth Restaurant in Edina, Minnesota. We ordered our food. We got our drinks. We chatted. We watched everyone around us getting served. Finally after 25 minutes or so we mentioned that we hadn't received our food.Another 10 minutes passed.

When our server returned , she said our food was on its way but because it had been so delayed, the restaurant was treating us to our lunch. Now, The Good Earth could have simply apologized. Orders get lost in restaurants all the time. They could have offered us a complimentary dessert or offered to pick up one of our meals.  They didn't have to comp everything.

That's the point. Their act of "unexpected  generous customer service" was so appreciated that my  loyalty to The Good Earth has now reached a new level .

Will this mean I will go to The Good Earth more often? Absolutely. And that is a good good thing.

Image Credit: Flickr Image from La Familia Brophy

Lost in Translation

As frustrated as I get talking to folks at call centers in India -- and it is a frustrating experience 90% of the time-- it is still better than trying to deal with companies who just don't think its important to give customers the option of a phone call.

Just today I wanted to try a new software called Notepager,I discovered it at a blog called Small Business Software which is run by the parent company of Notepager.

The concept sounds great. You install some software, create a recipient list and you can send txt messages via your computer. Why is that important? Primarily because I have a 17 year old daughter whose primary communication method is TXT messaging.

But also, TXT messages are a lot less invasive than the phone and  there are many people I deal with in business that don't have a PDA or Blackberry Being able to send a quick TXT message to a regular cell phone is just easier than leaving a voicemail.

The only problem--I can't get it to work. I read the instructions but something is getting lost in the translation of the setup wizard. I am obviously not understanding something that I need to do.

I have tried it three times. I believe in the three strikes and you're out philosophy of doing business.

 Yes, they have support forums up the yahzoo but I don't have the time or inclination to figure out which topic will provide me with the answers I need. Once I am at the point where I can't interpret the instructions, I want a translator and that usually means I want someone to talk to.

 This company doesn't  even have a technical support email system that I can send my questions to. So I sent it to the webmaster.If I don't get an answer soon I will be requesting a refund.

Then there is the design company that requests are discussions about layouts and creative design be conducted through a password protected communication system.

I sent the requirements, expecting the graphic designer would contact me to discuss the project. Instead they presented a layout. It was all wrong.

We gave feedback via their note system  and explained what we wanted.They revised.It was still all wrong.

We gave additional feedback. I wanted to call. They don't do business via the phone.They came back with yet another design, and it was still wrong.

My client, who also  believes in the three strikes and you're out philosophy of business, has instructed me to send them a note saying the job is cancelled.

Normally it is not something that I would do via a note. However, since that is how they want to do business, that is precisely what I did.

While I understand there is a benefit in having everything written so you have precise documentation, a quick 10 minute phone call would have been all the graphic designer would have needed to understand exactly what we were looking for.

After that call, if the graphic designer wanted to send a note confirming our requests.just for the documentation, then that would have been terrific.

But that's not how they are choosing to do business. Had they just picked up the phone at the beginning of the project, they would have saved time and kept a client.

Image Credit: Flickr image by MireO5

Tags: business, communication, mobile phones, software, advertising, customerservice

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