Bravo Gautam - unfortunately I've had similar experiences and can entirely agree that some British customer service would be more aptly titled customer disservice or customer ignorance!
It's a shocking job to have, handling complaints, but it does not excuse rudeness and chatting to friends on a customer-facing job.
Sadly, unless you pay more for your goods/services, this is what you have to expect. Even good department stores can sometimes have big queues to get things sorted.
And you always walk away thinking - I knew what I wanted - they didn't listen - I'm in a huff - I haven't got what I wanted!!!
Oh dear!
Did you get them elsewhere?
Hiama, no bloody point !!! Below is an email which I wrote to the supervisor of sales for Dell Europe :
Quote:
John,
Thanks for yr email. I had tried getting in touch with you yesterday, but looks like yr number was not working. Let me spell out my problem with Dell which I have had.
1. I placed an order with Dell on 2nd (or 1st) of April. The reason I placed the order on telephone and not on the web was that I wanted to buy the computer on my credit card, but get it delivered to the office address. I bought this fact to the attention of the salesperson, who assured me that this is not a problem and he will process the order accordingly.
2. I was told that I will get email confirmation of my order to which I have to reply in order for the purchase to be processed. I waited for a couple of days in vain for this email and started following up with your customer services, which kept directing me to the original sales person. I left several messages on his answer phone, but got no response back. In my frustration, I contacted the supervisor who then re-directed me to the sales person.
3. It so transpires that my order was not even booked on the date I placed it - apparently, the sale person "forgot" to do it. The order was finally booked on the 9th of April - one full week after placing it and I was given a delivery date of 19th April.
4. When I followed up on my order (order number XXXXX) on 24th April, I was told that this order has been cancelled by Dell, as the delivery address did not match the billing address on the credit card.
- This is precisely the reason why I had placed the order on the phone and not on the web.
- I had bought this to the attention of Gareth, even given him my credit card billing address, and got assurance for him that this will not be a problem
- My order was cancelled unilaterally by Dell, without even informing me. It was only when I followed up on my order that I came to know that this order was cancelled.
- I must have requested for at least 4 times to speak to a supervisor regarding this yesterday, left my numbers with your customer services, and no one called me back. I finally ran out of patience and cancelled the order.
- Today morning I find out that the order has been booked again without my express approval !
To treat a customer with such carelessness and disdain is a sure shot way of loosing business. I am absolutely appalled at the way Dell is treating a customer who is giving them business. As I said in my previous email, I have lost all faith in Dell's ability to give me an acceptable level of customer service, and hence I have no intention to purchase this equipment from Dell. I really don't want to go through this experience again - specially if something goes wrong with the machine once it is purchased.
If you wish to discuss this matter further, I can be contacted at <my phone number>. I look fwd to hearing from you.
Rgds
Guess what the response to this is
Quote:
Dear Gautam,
Your order has been cancelled as requested by you.
Regards
Don't let them get to you, B & Q pride themselves on their service, they are always advertising. I had a few problems with a local ASDA and wrote in complaining and got a £20 voucher back and they did what I wanted. You must persevere for all the poor unfortunate people that do not have your gift for communication. We owe it to them, if we don't get these people to shape up there is no way the service will improve.
Never give up, its my motto.
At the end of the day its your decision, I just can not bear to see such awful service be perpetuated.
Best of luck whatever you decide mate
p.s. On the Dell thing I had a friend who worked there and I am not surprised at the response you got
i went into Harrods just to see the store and find some chocolates (never found them) and needed to use a loo, found a gents loo on the 2nd floor where a neatly suited matron awaited me at the door "are you a member?" she said to me. "no" says i "i just need to use the facilites" "well' she says "that will be 1 pound then" she says, so i pays her the money and goes in the door only to find another uniformed gentleman who also wants a bit more of the filthy lucre.
Dys,
Thats scandalous, I would have peed on the plants in their exotic plants section. They are not just extracting the urine they're making you pay THEM for doing it -grrrrrrrrrrrr ( thanks to debs for the phraseology)
I'm spitting blood today I can tell you, no one better cross me !
the problem is i do so love London and it was my first vile experience, i often wonder if it was just because i look like a scruffy yank cowboy uncouth an all or is it an elitist thing?
I'd better not call/contact any suppliers today.
I'm having a long-running saga with the managing agent for the building in which I live...too boring for here, but I think he's up to no good.
I am sorry to see everybody so dissatisfied with their personal commerce.
Perhaps this will help. I meant to offer Lola another Brautigan about farting (and fish heads and avocados), but that, alas, has passed (hee hee hee); perhaps this will suffice, as graphic as it is...
And since we are discussing customer service - Dilbert has got such a topical strip...
I was in Harrods a few years ago and had the same experience at the door of the ladies. And I didn't look at all scruffy at the time (although I can......look scruffy.) I don't remember how much it cost, but it was a real turn off. But not enough of a turn off to find another less expensive place to pee. However, I've returned to London several times since, but I'll not be visiting Harrods. I used to go round and round with Sears about trash compactor bags a few years ago. Finally, I decided I didn't have help them keep their customers, and gave up complaining. Sears has almost not survived their customer service problems. Small reward........but still.
Thanks Patio for the encouragement there. Keep up the good work.
U.S. vs. Brits:
When the gf's stepfather was dying in Scotland, a U.S. carrier failed to get her a flight to anywhere in the British Isles using her more than bountiful frequent flyer numbers; they did generously offer to get her to Amsterdam for 50,000 miles, after which she would be on her own. She ended up spending an enormous amount of money on the flight, even with the bereavement rate (or whatever it's called; the only grudgingly offered it on the grounds that he wasn't dead yet, and demanded to see a copy of the death certificate at such time as it could be obtained to validate the still-exorbitant fare).
On the way back, the gf and her mother flew on British Airways. The former had a 1st class ticket that had already been booked (stepdad's return ticket was, of course, not transferable). The BA ticket agent on the phone insisted that they be on the same flight, and went to great lengths to make that possible, and the flight attendants insisted that mother and daughter should fly together, in first class.
It may not be the case for more trivial exchanges, but when service really mattered to the customers, the British company showed exemplary service and the American company showed itself worthy of a retributive flogging.
Goodness me! I shall tell you my Ritz loo experience upon my return from the salt mines.
Dear Aunty lowan,
An thinking of stepping into the dating world again. What do u think ?
Aunty Lowan -- if I may...
Dear Mr. Gautam:
Don't "step" into the dating world again. Since when has stepping got anybody anywhere? Run, if you must. Or dance. Or flounce, sashay, or saunter. Mosey, if you're feeling butch. Go in on point, if you are presently the other way inclined. Leap, dive, lunge, race, ski, luge into the dating world.
But for God's sake, don't do anything as noncommital and namby-pamby and BORING as STEP back into the dating world. The world is full of mere steppers, and they are doing absolutely nothing to elevate themselves above the scrum, the riff-raff, the common rabble that wander the streets, stepping from puddle to puddle with no hope of ever hurdling out of colorless mediocrity.
Sincerely,
Uncle Dog
(P.S.: Goose-stepping is out, as well.)
What Patiodog said - or barked!
