Re: Custome Service

Posted by Pale RIder on August 28, 2010 at 11:52:38 from (207.200.116.74):

In Reply to: Custome Service posted by fergienewbee on August 27, 2010 at 06:05:35:

I'm sure you don't need me to give you simplistic advice to the point of being trite such as: "I wouldn't go back to them again." No one who has other options would do otherwise. In most cases the problem stems from the fact that there IS no other dealer outlet within a practical distance to take your business to. Sure, you can drive 75 miles, waste several hours and so on but of course that is just being victimized in a differing fashion. If the company is large or requires that you speak with someone on the phone in another state just what are you supposed to do about that?
When I hear "we'll call you back" no matter what the source I just take it as a matter of course that I won't be called back. The practice seems so universal as to be able to make a pretty safe generalization of it. I'll give them a day and start calling back. I'll give them a another chance if it is not important and then put plan "B" into action which consists of calling them every day. I'll get the name and extension of who it is I talked to and if it is a small office try to deal with the same person each day. I'll be polite but given enough calls to the same person they will expedite the process just to get you off of their back. But it's when calling a large business that my resolve not to have my time wasted really comes into it's own. If I've gotten the runaround, a hassle or a "no" from some nameless, faceless drone I'll simply conclude the call, hang up, and promptly call again, get some other desk jockey and go through the same process while all the information is fresh and in front of me until I get some satisfaction. I couldn't even guess how often I have gotten different results from a different person. I'll call back three or four times if necessary and get three or four confirmations that a solution is in progress if necessary and once I am sure I'm not dealing with the same person of a couple of minutes ago, go through the process again. Sometimes you might need to call back at a different time of day to gain the desired effect but it almost always works.
Once it becomes clear that it is company practice to brush off customers with the short term thinking of merely the initial sale, I won't waste any more time in waiting to be dealt with as a valued customer. I'll request a part, schedule an appointment or phone the dispatcher 3-4-8-10 days in a row if necessary.---- Leaving for work?--time for a call, come in for lunch on the weekend?--make a call while eating lunch--answer the phone because a friend called?-- whoops!-looks like time to remind them again, get home from work and come in with the mail?--time for another call. What I won't do is let them tell me they'll call back and then patiently and politely wait for them to do so once they've falied to do so. I've been down that road too many times to not know what to expect.
It doesn't work 100% per cent of the time but it works quite well much of the time, especially when compared to the rate of success you will have in conceding to the standard US business practice of "the brush off".
As a small asside, once having received a particularily brusque brush off or poor service of some store manager I have increasingly begun to take the time to contact a office or regional, manager, the home office, the customer service department head, the personal department or whoever it takes to enlist the wrath of a higher up to bear on the uncaring individual. In a small one store operation it may or may not have the desired effect as it may be staffed by a close knit culture of sour individuals but I know from my varying experience with differing offices, managers and department heads that I have worked with, that some of them become as mad as I am if they perceive that they have lost a potential customer. I have sat in on more than one meeting, or been present in a number of situations when some fellow worker received a shocking dressing down to the point of losing their job, behind the scenes and away from the public eye. The individual who was the crux of the original situation probably never knew what happened but consequences followed.
There often is a disconnect between the department heads and counter sad sacks who the public sees and deals with. That disconnect can work for good or ill and it can work both ways but I've seen enough of it come down in support of the customer to invest a few minutes of time to speak with a higher up or crank out an e-mail. For some reason out local farmer's coop seems rife with poor customer help but I've obtained remarkable results with the afore mentioned methods as just one of many examples I can recall.
In a blighted business environment the results only get better in that higher ups are very concerned indeed that their often tenuous position not becomed threatened by ill reports to their own higher ups or clients become lost.
There is a particularily comforting satisfaction that derives from emerging victoriously over some disrespectful and callous treatment in which you have been dismissed without consideration concern especially when that consideration and concern has been garnered with a claim of "customer service" or a company or product gaurantee.

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