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Michael Hartlef
14-10-2007, 11:53
Here is a true little story :)

I knew I had to do something about my internet and phone cost. This is my current situation:

1) 14,- Euro to AOL (ISP), because my wife doesn't wanna loose her email adress
2) 26,- Euro to the local phone company for the ISDN telephon connection.
3) 27,- Euro to 1&1 (my ISP) for the DSL connection
4) 5,- Euro for the DSL6000 flat rate
5) 10,- Euro for the VoIP phone flat rate (calls to german regular phones and some european countries

That makes 82 Euro each month fixed cost.

Ok, my first look was at AOL, what do they offer. They offer a complete package, including telefonconnection, all flat rates, and DSL4000, for around 50 Euro.
But I can't get it as a long time customer. New customers can order it. Don't aks me
why (but see later that this seems to be business).

Ok, I look at 1&1, my current provider. They offer a DSL16000 package with VoIP flat rate, DSL flat rate, a mobil flatrate, and over 400 movies free (a new service over the internet). This cost 29 Euro without the telefonconnection, or 39 Euro with it. Good rate I say and try to order it. TRY! But I can't order the package for 39 euro as I'm a current customer. NEW customers can. WTF, why is this. SO I order the 29 euro one and plan on switch the phone connection to analog for 14 euro a month.

At the summary page it tells me that the phone flat rate is actually just the 1000 minutes free. I say WTF and email the customers service. I ask two questions:

My email 1:

1. Why can I get no complete package for 39 Euro?
2. Why the 1000 minute limit?

Their answer 1:

1. You will be able to get it later this year. For more questions pleace call our service line (99cents a minute)
2. No answer about this

My second email:

1. You dind't answer my questions no1. completely, why can't I get it, a long time customer
2. What's up with questions 2

Their answer 2:

1. No answer about this
2. Because its the office rate.

My email 3:

1. Office rate? WTF? What is this?

Their answer 3:

1. Office rate is the same as nomal rate, but limit phone flatrate for businesses

My email 4:

1. Why do I get rated as a business? This is a private used connection!

Their answer 4:

1. Because the name of the contract holder sounds like a business (weGetItRight)
If it isn't a business, we need to change the contract

Explanation: In 2000, I signed up my webhosting under my business name.
The business was closed in 2002 and I changed names over their website
and try to change the datas for the domain holder. I found out now, that their
didn't change it.

My email 5:

No need to change, I'm quiting now. Including my 14 euro/month webhosting( for 3 domains) , which I can get better and cheaper for 10 euro/month for 5 domains.


Summary: The incompetence of the customer service, that could have explained everything in the first answer and offer me a fast and easy solution was to much to bother. I had a lot of problems with them when my DLS connection was activated in 2005 too. Now they loose a long time customer. Good move I say.

Cheers
Michael

Randall
14-10-2007, 17:21
Yes, the mystery of poor customer service. It just doesn't make sense, does it? It is frequently the large organizations with large customer service departments that are the worse offenders. I would expect large organizations to have the best service, but no they do not. It is indeed a mystery!

Why the poor service? I don't really know, but I can offer a theory.

In most organizations, customer service is viewed only as a necessary cost of doing business, a cost management is always seeking to reduce. Progressive, well run organizations view customer service as part of their product, and try to provide excellent service because it differentiates them from their competition. If an organization has no competition, then there is no reason to provide a better product.

So, in most organizations, customer service is viewed as a cost, a cost management would like to reduce. It is not unusual for management to implement measurement systems to improve personnel performance. To get their customer service staff to handle more calls (and reduce the number of staff they need), they might measure the number of calls each customer service person handles per day, or the time spent on each call. Someone who is handling less than X calls per day, must be goofing off! Someone who is spending more than x seconds on a call must be just talking excessively.

The problem with measurement systems is that although they drive behavior, it is usually the wrong behavior. If a company measures calls/emails handled per day, the customer service people will spend as little time on each call/email as possible. They don't care if they answered your questions, or if they pissed you off, just that they meet their "call per day" targets. This type of measurement system does reduce costs for the organization since it reduces their staff required, but the damage it does is immeasurable.

The mystery is that organizations spend a lot of money in marketing and advertising to attract customers, then in a foolish attempt to save a little money, destroy their hard won relationship with their customers and drive them away.

A well run company treats customer service as part of their product, and as part of their marketing and advertising. Delight a customer with excellent customer service, and they will recommend your product/service to others. The cost to attract new customers through marketing and advertising is very high. While the cost to provide excellent customer service is higher than poor customer service, retaining customers, and gaining new customers through excellent service more than makes up the cost difference.

Randall

ErosOlmi
14-10-2007, 17:51
Sad but true considerations Randall.

kryton9
14-10-2007, 19:37
Mike it seems this kind of thing is Universal. 1&1 is offering nice new features to new customers. About these new services it says as an existing customer I am entitled to two of them, so I wrote to order the two I wanted. They said it wasn't available yet to existing customers but in 2 weeks it would be. This was in the end of May, it has yet to be available to me. I wrote back again towards the end of June and they said it was coming in a few more weeks... oh well.

RobertoBianchi
15-10-2007, 09:22
Michael,

I also have rearranged the telephone and internet provider switching from TELECOM Italy to TELE2 Italy.
With telecom I have an expense of about €60 per month with a pay per use internet connection (640KB).
Instead TELE2 now offering at €33.95 (per month) full national phone call and flat (24x7) Internet ADSL 2MB, the contracts' duration is annual.
I think that for reduce costs customers should continuously change suppliers in order to exploit the commercial entry.
For now the result of my swicth is about twenty days of Internet blackout >:(

Bye,
Roberto

Petr Schreiber
15-10-2007, 09:42
I have internet and telephone from O2 ( ate Telecom here or something similar :) )

Result is not brutal blackout as in Robertos case, but sometimes few times a day I have to restart modem.
I am not sure if it is modem or provider problem but it is pretty weird.


Petr

Michael Hartlef
18-10-2007, 08:23
To quite the contracts I had to call them and ask for activating a form which I can then download and fax it. NOW, this guy was very friendly and NOW I can get the complete package. They just need a fax stating that I don't use it commercially and then I can get the complete phone flat rate.

He appologized for the bad email service I got and I think I will stay with them, as the package is the best and very reliable.

Michael Hartlef
12-11-2007, 16:04
It gets better and better. ::)

I ordered the upgrade to the complete package, including the telephone connection. They wrote back to me that they are sorry and can not fullfill the order. Reason: DSL is technically not available at my place and there is no timeframe when it will be available.

Mmmmh. Should I tell them that I have allready DSL with them? ;D
Stupid morons.

ErosOlmi
12-11-2007, 16:07
Mmmmh. Should I tell them that I have allready DSL with them? ;D


We say: "do not wake-up the sleeping dog!"
Better not to say them otherwise they will remove DSL :D

Michael Clease
12-11-2007, 18:28
Do you pay for your DSL mike?

I would ask for a refund as they say that they do not supply it ;D

Michael Hartlef
13-11-2007, 08:12
Do you pay for your DSL mike?

I would ask for a refund as they say that they do not supply it ;D


Thanks for the idea, that is great. I will use this in my answering letter!