{"id":1655,"date":"2010-08-04T13:39:06","date_gmt":"2010-08-04T20:39:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.coolkarma.com\/dharma\/?p=1655"},"modified":"2010-08-15T14:04:56","modified_gmt":"2010-08-15T21:04:56","slug":"a-customer-service-comedy-of-errors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/?p=1655","title":{"rendered":"A Customer Service Comedy of Errors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.coolkarma.com\/dharma\/wp-content\/uploads\/old-lady-with-headset.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-1656\" title=\"old-lady-with-headset\" src=\"http:\/\/www.coolkarma.com\/dharma\/wp-content\/uploads\/old-lady-with-headset-224x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"224\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/old-lady-with-headset-224x300.jpg 224w, https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/old-lady-with-headset.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 224px) 100vw, 224px\" \/><\/a>Maybe my expectations are too high.\u00a0 Growing up at the tail edge of the baby boomers I can still remember when all <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Filling_station\" target=\"_blank\">gas stations where full service<\/a>; \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Harry_Gordon_Selfridge\" target=\"_blank\">the customer is always right<\/a>\u201d or \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Harry_Gordon_Selfridge\" target=\"_blank\">&#8216;Le client n&#8217;a jamais tort<\/a>\u201d \u2013 take your pick; when you counted on <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Service_with_a_Smile\" target=\"_blank\">Service with a Smile<\/a>; and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.avis.com.cy\/We_try_harder.html\" target=\"_blank\">We Try Harder Because We Have To<\/a>.\u00a0 It would seem <strong>we don\u2019t <em>have to<\/em> any more<\/strong>.\u00a0\u00a0 Sure the local <a href=\"http:\/\/walmartwatch.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">mega-mart<\/a> has a kindly old man at the door greeting you with a cart so we can all feel good about the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newrules.org\/retail\/news\/walmart-settles-predatory-pricing-charge\" target=\"_blank\">predatory pricing<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.msnbc.msn.com\/id\/37235693\/\" target=\"_blank\">toxic merchandise<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/findarticles.com\/p\/articles\/mi_qa4103\/is_200404\/ai_n9384014\/\" target=\"_blank\">low employee wages<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.corpwatch.org\/article.php?id=9649\" target=\"_blank\">child labor law violations<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/stories\/2006\/03\/03\/health\/main1369355.shtml\" target=\"_blank\">product selection in support of particular ideology<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB10001424052748703465204575208280035548858.html\" target=\"_blank\">discrimination against women<\/a>.\u00a0 I do suspect it is more than just customer courtesy that we sacrificed for low prices and next day delivery.<\/p>\n<p>Maybe it is a combination of faceless technology and outsourced global helpdesks but as the system that supports the customer becomes more complex and further divested from consumer needs a simple mistake quickly becomes a comedy of errors.\u00a0 My most recent <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/SNAFU\" target=\"_blank\">SNAFU<\/a> involves a major American-based multinational electronic commerce company, headquartered in Seattle, Washington.\u00a0 Oh, let\u2019s just call them AwesomeDotCom for the sake of anonymity.\u00a0 It was late on a Thursday night and I was ordering protein bars for the kids to pack the next week for lunch breaks at their summer jobs.\u00a0 I am pretty particular about protein bars.\u00a0 For me, they have to have at least as much protein per gram as sugar.\u00a0 They can\u2019t have artificial ingredients, preservatives or other questionable fillers.\u00a0 On a fixed income, I only buy what is on sale and must qualify for free prime shipping (a feature of AwesomeDotCom \u2013 not to mention any names.)\u00a0 So this night I found an item and clicked the buy-now button only to see a moment later that both Luna and Cliff bars were being offered at a better subscribe and save option.\u00a0 So I quickly went to my recent orders and attempted to DELETE the item I had just confirmed with one-click.\u00a0 But the status on my order was set to some version of \u201calready shipping\u201d and I was unable to cancel from within my own account.<\/p>\n<p>Ok, fast forward to recap this one as it appeared in the reality show known as <strong><em>God Has A Sense Of Humor Why Don\u2019t You?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li> I placed a call using the \u201ccall us \u2013 and \u2013 we\u2019ll call you\u201d program provided by Awesome.<\/li>\n<li>The pre-programmed tele-agent returns my call and instantaneously places me on hold for almost an hour.<\/li>\n<li>At midnight I give up on the phone-tree and decide to send an email to their helpdesk.<\/li>\n<li>The next morning I receive a response from the A-Team:<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><em>\u201cHello, <\/em><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><em>I tried to cancel your order, but it&#8217;s already been shipped. <\/em><\/span><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><em>Yada- yada-yada<\/em><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><em>I see that the order has not yet been shipped. \u00a0In this case, I&#8217;ll make an one-time exception and advance refund for you order cost. <\/em><\/span><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><em>Yada- yada-yada<\/em><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><em>As the order hasn&#8217;t shipped, I&#8217;ll not be able to refund you the order cost. <\/em><\/span><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><em>Yada- yada-yada<\/em><\/address>\n<address style=\"padding-left: 60px;\"><em>Thank you for your recent inquiry. Did I solve your problem?\u201d<\/em><\/address>\n<ul>\n<li>Whaaaa?\u00a0 Did the item ship?\u00a0 Was I going to be getting a refund?\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=sShMA85pv8M\" target=\"_blank\">Who\u2019s on first<\/a>?<\/li>\n<li>Next day I receive another email from Team Awesome.\u00a0 Confirming the refund has been processed and they give me a phone number for RightOn the delivery agent (name changed) to refuse delivery.<\/li>\n<li>RightOn takes my 2,560 character order number and tracks package to a warehouse down the street and tells me they will have the foreman pull the package before it gets on the truck.<\/li>\n<li>Five days go by and I begin to wonder where my Luna and Cliff bars are \u2026. <em>You see where this is going don\u2019t you?<\/em><\/li>\n<li>AwesomeDotCom tracking history shows that ALL of my packages have been refused.<\/li>\n<li>I call RightOn and they admit that it was probably the case that warehouse just decided to pull ALL OF THE DELIVERIES for me that day.\u00a0 They assure me it\u2019s not a problem and that they\u2019ll make notes in my account that will inform AwesomeDotCom that\u00a0 it was their error.<\/li>\n<li>Insert appropriate self-loathing as the egoic mind yells <em>these things wouldn\u2019t happen if I were \u201cwell\u201d and could get to the damn store myself.<\/em><\/li>\n<li>I phone AwesomeDotCom and this time I get a live agent \u2026. who doesn\u2019t appear to be a native of Seattle Washington.<\/li>\n<li>Said agent says that she can\u2019t process a refund until the packages arrive back because *I* cancelled the orders.<\/li>\n<li>I explain the RightOn error \u2013 again, and she places me on hold to talk to call RightOn for verification.<\/li>\n<li>When she returns she tells me that RightOn told her that I canceled the order and they won\u2019t be able to refund my purchase.<\/li>\n<li>I ask if it might be possible to have a three way conference call with RightOn, so that we can bring in the other agent that I just spoke with.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cI just make a note in your account that <strong><em>maybe<\/em><\/strong> you didn\u2019t refuse package.\u00a0 Why don\u2019t you just go back on line and re-order.\u201d\u00a0 She tells me.<\/li>\n<li>I try for a few more moments to bring us all on the same page \u2026 but eventually sigh and open up my browser window and re-ordered my Luna and Cliff bars.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Somewhere along the line of improbable circumstances, I just felt like my experience didn\u2019t much matter.\u00a0 I even blamed myself, because after all it was MY initial error in placing the wrong order.\u00a0 And these things don\u2019t happen often.\u00a0 Right?\u00a0 Well ok, maybe it\u2019s just this week.<\/p>\n<p>Today I received a call from my online grocery delivery company \u2013 <a href=\"http:\/\/Vons.com\" target=\"_blank\">Vons.com<\/a>.\u00a0 Debbie knows me by name.\u00a0 It would be nice, kind of like the local grocer knowing the names of all your kids and waves to you at soccer practice.\u00a0 But Debbie knows me by name because she calls me every couple of months to tell me that my credit card has been declined. \u00a0Three guesses what credit card we use?\u00a0 Yes, my Visa card is with AwesomeDotCom.\u00a0 So I get to Chase up that tree once again.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Press 2 now if your card has been declined.<\/li>\n<li>Can you confirm the following transaction?\u00a0 If yes, press 1 now.<\/li>\n<li>Thank you.\u00a0 Good-bye.<\/li>\n<li>Good bye?\u00a0 Wait, I want to talk to a person.<\/li>\n<li>So begins the long on-hold process<\/li>\n<li>\u201cHow can I help you?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>I begin to explain my situation \u2026<\/li>\n<li>\u201cI\u2019ll need to transfer you to our fraud division\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Back to the waiting game.<\/li>\n<li>I explain to \u201cfraud\u201d that I\u2019ve been placing orders with Vons for over five years for roughly the same amount each week.\u00a0 But yet every couple of months my credit card is declined.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cThat shouldn\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>I agreed.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cYou should sign up for our fee service to text message you?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Turns out she was saying FREE \u2026 no getting back those 90 seconds.<\/li>\n<li>I explain that I was already enrolled in the text message alert system.<\/li>\n<li>The fraud-agent confirmed that I was.<\/li>\n<li>Did you text me this morning?\u00a0 I asked.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cNo it doesn\u2019t appear that we did.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>I don\u2019t think you really have that service then.\u00a0 You take our information \u2026 but you really aren\u2019t providing a \u201cservice\u201d in the traditional sense if you don\u2019t call.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cWell we can call you at your home phone?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>You have my number on file right?<\/li>\n<li>\u201cYes.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Did you call me today to tell me you were declining my groceries again?<\/li>\n<li>\u201cNo\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Yeah, I don\u2019t think that service is working either.\u00a0 Please, this happens with frustrating frequency, can you see if there is an actual programmer or a manager I can speak with?<\/li>\n<li>Back to the queue \u2026 with Taylor Swift <em>You Belong With Me<\/em> \u2026 I start humming along and my daughter bobs her head with the music.<\/li>\n<li>Call waiting \u2026 It\u2019s Debbie again seeing if she can run the card for a third time.<\/li>\n<li>I confirm she can and in the process LOOSE my spot in the queue as the phone disconnects from the credit card company.<\/li>\n<li>Go back to step one \u2026 explain that I need fraud division \u2026 re-tell my story to fraud agent \u2013 beg with tear in my eye for a supervisor.<\/li>\n<li>Back on hold \u2026 Taylor Swift is now middle aged and performing in Airport Hotels.<\/li>\n<li>Ta-Da!\u00a0 A technical manager comes on the line, apologizes for my troubles and insists SHE can recode my account so that this won\u2019t happen again.<\/li>\n<li>But first \u2026 she\u2019ll need to do a few \u201csecurity questions\u201d<\/li>\n<li>She programs in the Fraud-Detector-101 to spit out a list of multiple choice questions.\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cWhich of these names have you used?\u201d\n<ul>\n<li>Jones<\/li>\n<li>Buckingham<\/li>\n<li>Krimmer<\/li>\n<li>Dallas<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>I answer correctly<\/li>\n<li>\u201cWhich of these occupations did you once have?\u201d\n<ul>\n<li>Pharmaceutical representative<\/li>\n<li>School teacher<\/li>\n<li>Nurse<\/li>\n<li>Astronaut<\/li>\n<li>Or none of the above\u2026<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>I have no idea what titles she rattled off, but I knew I wasn\u2019t any of those things in <strong><em>this<\/em><\/strong> lifetime.\u00a0 So I answered none of the above.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cWhich of these street names did you have?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Beg pardon, did you say street name?<\/li>\n<li>\u201cYes.\u00a0 Which of these <em><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">street names<\/span><\/em> did you have?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>I must have been on low blood sugar (you know lack of groceries and all) because the only thing I could think of was some kind of \u201cgang name\u201d or \u201cscreen name\u201d reference.\u00a0 Really?\u00a0 Why would they need to know that I go by Earth-MaFa62?<\/li>\n<li>She rattles off a list of names.<\/li>\n<li>I answer none of the above.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cOoo, I\u2019m sorry you didn\u2019t pass that one.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>I felt like I was a contestant on a game show and had just lost the grande prize.\u00a0 Had she said WHAT STREET DID YOU ONCE LIVE ON I may have been able to give a nod to Doreen.\u00a0 But I thought it was just some street chick name.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cI\u2019ll have to try some alternate questions.\u00a0 Do you know how much your mortgage is?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>No.\u00a0 Not really, it\u2019s on autopay through my bank.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cDo you know who you have your mortgage with?\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Is it Chase?<\/li>\n<li>\u201cOk, we\u2019ll go with that.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Turns out my mortgage is with a different bank entirely \u2026 but apparently she had had enough of me too and conceded to go ahead and make the changes so that Debbie doesn\u2019t have to call me anymore and so that my family can eat more than just the protein bars being delivered from AwesomeDotCom.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.coolkarma.com\/dharma\/wp-content\/uploads\/A-User-Is-VERTICAL-BLOCK.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-1657\" title=\"A User Is - VERTICAL BLOCK\" src=\"http:\/\/www.coolkarma.com\/dharma\/wp-content\/uploads\/A-User-Is-VERTICAL-BLOCK-226x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"226\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/A-User-Is-VERTICAL-BLOCK-226x300.jpg 226w, https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/A-User-Is-VERTICAL-BLOCK-773x1024.jpg 773w, https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/A-User-Is-VERTICAL-BLOCK.jpg 1314w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 226px) 100vw, 226px\" \/><\/a>When I was a Zen manager in an IT department each new staff member I hired received a printout of my credo \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.coolkarma.com\/dharma\/wp-content\/uploads\/A-User-Is-VERTICAL-BLOCK.jpg\" target=\"_blank\">A User Is<\/a>\u201d and a copy of the \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Four-Agreements-Practical-Personal-Freedom\/dp\/1878424319\" target=\"_blank\">Four Agreements<\/a>\u201d by <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Miguel_%C3%81ngel_Ruiz\" target=\"_blank\">Don Miguel Ruiz<\/a>.\u00a0 It was my personal mission to make our community feel comfortable and confident regardless of their particular problem or need.\u00a0 Foregoing computereeze and concentrating on practical advice with annotated examples helped bridge the knowledge gap and allowed us to excel (only small back office pun intended.)<\/p>\n<p>I think perhaps it is the language or culture gap that I miss when I interface with the plethora of outsourced oversees support specialists that run the helpdesk for most of our retail markets.\u00a0 Or maybe our technology systems have grown so far from the needs of the customer stakeholder base that it truly feels I am at the mercy of a cyborg when I call with a problem.<\/p>\n<p>In all honesty, my experience in large is that each of the humans I come in to contact with are kind people, it\u2019s just that they seem unempowered to resolve my problem.\u00a0 As a conspiracy theorist I might venture that this is by design, as most consumers give up in frustration after the long hold with mind numbing techno-musak (no offense to Taylor Swift) and endless looping phone trees.<\/p>\n<p>So maybe we don\u2019t try harder, we can\u2019t see if they are smiling on the other end of the phone line and it clearly doesn\u2019t matter who is right \u2026 if each of us can see the comedy of the game and choose for ourSelf to BE of Service regardless of these new paradigms and practices \u2026 well then maybe we won\u2019t feel as trapped the next time we find our self in helpdesk hell.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Maybe my expectations are too high.\u00a0 Growing up at the tail edge of the baby<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[58,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-customer-service","category-humor"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1655"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1729,"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1655\/revisions\/1729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.karmabytes.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}