Whatever happened to customer service?

If you haven’t noticed by now, I appreciate good customer service and get upset with poor service. I haven’t really ranted about customer service for awhile so…

48-Hours to Schedule an Oil Change

When I needed to schedule an oil change, I went to the dealership website and they direct all service appointments to this online scheduling form… as in you can’t call the service department directly or find how to make an appointment if you don’t want to do the form. So I filled in the form and waited more than 24 hours. I heard nothing… so I called the dealership and asked to be transferred to service. I had to leave a voice mail. I missed the call back (let me not they called me back right at closing time) and asked me to call them the next day when they were open again. I said that I wanted an appointment for any time on Friday. ANY TIME! I can even drop my car off in the morning and leave it with them all day to squeeze in. Why couldn’t they just schedule it or tell me that Friday wasn’t available?  The next morning, before they were “open” I actually got an email, saying to call and schedule an appointment for the next week and Friday wasn’t good. Two days after I made the original request.  I was able to get an appointment for tomorrow so they called my husband to confirm. What is that? I’ve mentioned before that the dealer hasn’t been the best about customer service anyway. I love my car, but when my lease is up, I’ll be taking my business elsewhere.

Meter Inspection Date

Then the gas company needs to inspect our meter, which surprise, surprise it’s not accessible from the outside and someone needs to let them into our home to look at the meter. The postcard they sent said, “make every effort to do the work at a date a time that is convenient for you.”

The postcard’s message.

That turned out to be a load of crap. We tried to schedule a real, actual appointment at a convenient time just to find out that you aren’t able to schedule a date and time, just give them a time frame (ie morning, afternoon, evening) and they’ll call you “30 minutes” before arriving at your house. My husband was able to get us “an evening” which is defined by 4:30-8:30 on some evening at some time in the future… We didn’t know when. Last night when we got home, there was a tag on the door that they had come for an inspection. Neither of us got a call, they just showed up sometime during the work day. Brad called them and explained that they never called, had they called him he could have been home and the inspection would be done… wonder of wonders! They gave us a date… an actual date for the inspection! Like he’d asked for in the first place. Let’s see if we actually get a call now…

Have you noticed a recent increase in advertising that highlight excellent service as a benefit? The reason why is because everyone pretty much sucks at customer service, so companies that have truly good service have their different and better right there.

Rant Over.

Related Posts:

Best Friend of Big Brother?

The Utility Circus

You’re Doing It Wrong

4 thoughts on “Whatever happened to customer service?

  1. Pingback: Friday Five: Pondering | probablyrachel

  2. I like the facebook pages for other blogs that I follow. I have no rhyme or reason as to why, but I do like them.

  3. When I bought my last phone I went into the store with my ex, whom I was still dating at the time, having researched and narrowed my choices down to two. The first sales rep we talked to talked to D instead of me the entire time, despite me telling him numerous times that the phone was being purchased BY ME, FOR ME and that D had nothing to do with it because we were both still on our family’s accounts. He assumed that D knew more about technology (he doesn’t) and that I didn’t know what I was talking about (I did). I was so irritated. Then another guy came to help and the first thing he said to me was “wow, looks like you did your homework!” Then he discussed the pros and cons of the two phones with me before ultimately agreeing that I was making a great choice. As a side note, I still have and love that phone to this day, a year and a half later!

  4. Pingback: Friday Five: Pondering | ProbablyRachel

Leave a Reply to Laura Cancel reply