Amazon Has Abdicated

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Has anyone noticed that since the coronavirus lockdown started, you can't get customer service from Amazon? About the time the lockdown started, they stopped providing phone customer service. They still had help from online chat and if you were patient enough and lucky, you could sometimes get help there. Tonight I tried to get help from this chat, since they are still not answering phones, and the way it works, is that they first have a program answer you that is a moron unless you ask it simple popular questions, but if you demand to speak to a person, now only lets you leave leave a message.

You'd think that people would be complaining about it on the Internet, but I find virtually nothing.

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@Brandon9000,

We are in the middle of a global pandemic. Many offices, including call centers, have shut down and sent their employees home. I imagine that as part of Amazon's policy of sending home non-essential employees, they have greatly diminished their call centers.

I don't think it is surprising at all given the situation we are all facing.

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@maxdancona,

Fair point, but almost no customer service at all seems a little extreme, especially when you have a problem. I guess the way it works is that you try with them and if you don't get what you want, you cancel the order and try somebody else. You've then lost time which sometimes you can't afford to lose. I suppose that some people even have serious Amazon problems, like trying to investigate a purchase which may indicate that someone has gained access to your credit card.

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@Brandon9000,

I would argue that you can dispute credit card charges with your credit card. I would not be surprised if the credit card companies can talk to fraud specialists at Amazon that normal people can't reach.

Most things on Amazon can be done online including returns and reporting lost items.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

I would argue that you can dispute credit card charges with your credit card. I would not be surprised if the credit card companies can talk to fraud specialists at Amazon that normal people can't reach.

Most things on Amazon can be done online including returns and reporting lost items.

Before you can dispute a charge, sometimes you would like to know what it was for in case it was legitimate. Sometimes Amazon charges appear on your bank statement with a very cryptic acronym or something to describe them.

Most things can be done never speaking to a human, but sometimes you'd like to ask a question, and that's not unreasonable.

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@Brandon9000,

Really? I had two problems and couldn't find any sort of phone contact, and this was last year. I concluded they were more interested in sales volume than individual customers. As a matter of fact, I've had very little use for Amazon since that experience. Often times, I can get what I want from Walmart online.

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@Brandon9000,

I agree with you.

But... I don't think you are going to get very much human customer service from anyone right now. If you send all the human beings home, you simply can not provide human customer service. That's neither reasonable or unreasonable. It's just reality.

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@roger,

roger wrote:

Really? I had two problems and couldn't find any sort of phone contact, and this was last year. I concluded they were more interested in sales volume than individual customers. As a matter of fact, I've had very little use for Amazon since that experience. Often times, I can get what I want from Walmart online.

I suppose it depends on the type of customer. I rarely want to talk to a human being. Human beings are inefficient.

I don't care if Amazon sees me as an "individual" customer. I go to Amazon because they can deliver things to me quickly and reliably at a low price.

At Amazon, I have returned several items, disputed a price and complained that something I paid for didn't arrive. I did all of these things through the website with computer generated email. All of them were resolved satisfactorily without me ever having to talk to a human being. I like that.

I believe that the computer generated emails from Amazon tell me that I am a valued customer, and thank me for my business... Frankly I could care less. For me Amazon is a business I use to buy stuff, I have no need for a caring relationship with them.

I am the opposite of you guys, I get upset when I have to talk to a human being for something that I really should be able to handle on their website.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

I agree with you.

But... I don't think you are going to get very much human customer service from anyone right now. If you send all the human beings home, you simply can not provide human customer service. That's neither reasonable or unreasonable. It's just reality.

My suspicion is that I could still reach Walmart or Target customer service, although I haven't tested it.

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@Brandon9000,

I have been seeing this from almost every business.

My credit card says to send an email with your question or go online as they have very limited customer service. (I did get someone).

I had a question on a medical bill that was incorrect - I called them and same thing - they said they do not have anyone working in the office so send an email with your question. I did get a response via email that they were researching - wasn't an automatic response as it addressed my specific question.

It seems many businesses for safety reasons do not have customer service reps coming into the office or else there are very few (probably to maintain social distancing).

I think we all need to patient about this - however, you should be able to reach someone in some way - although you may not hear back for a couple of days.

to answer your question on amazon - I have not tried to reach them via customer service recently, however, although amazon is pretty good about deliveries and so forth - they s*ck if you have an issue and need to talk with a person. Even prior to covid - the few times I have had to deal with customer service as in a person they stink. That is really the only complaint I have had with them.

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@roger,

roger wrote:

Really? I had two problems and couldn't find any sort of phone contact, and this was last year. I concluded they were more interested in sales volume than individual customers. As a matter of fact, I've had very little use for Amazon since that experience. Often times, I can get what I want from Walmart online.

Yes - I have discovered Walmart - I just got a package as we speak! Ordered all my essentials - I even got toilet paper with no limit! As long as you spend $35 or more - free 2 day delivery ! I even got it early the first time I ordered!

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@Linkat,

Quote:

Ordered all my essentials - I even got toilet paper with no limit!

I am just curious... exactly how much toilet paper is that?

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@maxdancona,

A lot!

No I had other things as well - just every where else it was saying only one or two limit - I got 2 packs of the multi packs of mega rolls - I think each pack had 12 rolls - I like the mega rolls as then I don't have to replace them as frequently.

Got all the other stuff like laundry soap, dishwasher soap, toothpaste, etc.

1 Reply

@Linkat,

I think you could have gotten more Wink

After all, it is limitless!

1 Reply

@maxdancona,

But, why? Even in little old Farmington, it's back on the shelves.

1 Reply

@roger,

roger wrote:

But, why? Even in little old Farmington, it's back on the shelves.

It is still tough to get here. You can get it - it just is tough. Go down any grocery store, drug store, and there are no paper products or almost none. The other day the grocery store had tons of just single row TP - the Scotts kind that feel like sand paper - and even that was a limit.

So I look online at places I know list inventory in store (and is pretty reliable) and there is none - staples, office max, lowes, walgreens, etc. maybe just the industrial kind.

Then I look at walmart for kicks and I could get the good stuff! So it is out there you just need to search for it.

1 Reply

@Linkat,

Yeah. For some things, like Dawn, the supermarkets are still out. There's usually some at Dollar General and Family Dollar. The situation is hard to believe.

1 Reply

@roger,

yeah this is why I made this thread:

Weird items that are out of stock....it seems that there are some stray odd things I have had difficulty finding.

https://able2know.org/topic/548060-1#post-7003739

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I'll tell you one strange thing, though. When Amazon stops taking phone calls, you'd expect some Internet chatter about it, right? Well, I see none, just the usual posts about how to get to a human quickly. What, none of the billions of Internet users noticed?

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@Brandon9000,

That's a bit surprising, especially given that the coronavirus is nearly the best thing that ever happened to them.

1 Reply

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