Starting Off Badly

Posted: Mon 6 November, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Thoughts | Leave a comment »

Having signed up about ten days ago for that Open University course, I was expecting to get a bundle of paperwork, course information etc. last week. But it didn’t arrive. Hmm, that sounds familiar from last time I signed up with them.

Anyway, having given it a clear two weeks ’til today to allow them time to be inefficient, I gave them a call today. Turns out, despite having paid, and the money having left my account, they’d still got my account listed as “on hold” , rather than “registered”.

I’ve sorted it now, and the paperwork should be on its way. But really, it’s not an auspicious start to the course, is it?

Tossers

Posted: Fri 27 October, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Work-related | Leave a comment »

Regular readers may recall that a good few months ago, I had an interview with a certain mobile telecoms company. At the time it went really well, and would’ve been great to change jobs and do a year with them – working within a huge corporation is something my CV currently lacks, as the last one I worked for was back in 2002 or so.

Anyway, following the interview, the feedback was really positive, and they said to the agency I’d applied through that they wanted to offer me a job. And then it all went quiet. Calls weren’t returned, nothing got confirmed, and indeed the telecoms company failed to communicate with either myself or the agency at all. So I ended up looking around again, and at the same time the decision was made for us to move towards Norfolk.

I got a call today from that agency, asking if I was still available for work. The telecoms company had come back to the agency, wanting me to work for them. And was I available to start next week?

Quite honestly, in the face of an attitude like that, even if I were available, I wouldn’t want to work for a company that was so blatantly disinterested in people, and so contemptuous of anything except themselves. Just unbelievable.

Turns of Phrase

Posted: Thu 26 October, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Getting Organised, Weirdness | Leave a comment »

The other night I had to talk to a bank’s “customer services” department. I’ve been trying to set up a savings account, and they offered one of the better rates around (roughly 4.75%) so I sent in an application. Two months ago. They’re only just processing the application now, and were calling to find out whether I knew my (now-ex) employer’s company number, because they couldn’t find the company on Companies House, and directory enquiries couldn’t find the phone number. (In fairness on that point, I can’t find the phone number either)

So they called me, but wouldn’t/couldn’t

  1. accept the number if I gave it to them
  2. accept the company number if I gave it to them
  3. use the company’s website to find the number
    or
  4. find the company details in the HSBC system, even though the company banks with HSBC

Which rather led me to question just what the point of the call was. Unfortunately, the woman I was speaking to couldn’t actually tell me what the point was, except to go through the cyclical argument of “well, it’s on the form” – “but you can’t find the information, and it’s irrelevent anyway, so why do you need it?” – “because it’s on the form”

Eventually, we had the following conversation snippet

Me: OK, this is now utterly farcical. Can I speak to your supervisor please?
Her: Sir, I’m the on-duty supervisor tonight.
Me: OK, can I get a call from your manager tomorrow then?
Her: I don’t know. It’s not the usual procedure…
Me: Fine. Can I speak to someone who’s even vaguely competent, or at the very least capable of independent thought?
Her: …

I don’t think First Direct have any of those…

Anyway, I’m now going to use a different bank – First Direct can get stuffed if that call is representative of their attitude to customers.

Travelodge and Watchdog

Posted: Wed 25 October, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, General, Travel | 1 Comment »

One thing that interested me last night was to catch BBC’s Watchdog programme, which featured Travelodge being shitepots. Nothing new there – but I didn’t know about this particular policy of Travelodge’s.

Turns out that despite offering a “guaranteed” room when you book with them, they have a policy of overbooking, so you could easily find yourself still without a room. They call this a “last man standing” policy – although it might as well be called a “last man sleeps in his car” policy. Of course, they can then say they’ve got a room at another Travelodge, but if you head off there (assuming that you can, have a car, and all that jazz) and someone else gets there before you, you can still not have a room.

And even better, because you can’t get a room at the original place, you don’t check in. Which means that the devious scumbags then get to charge you a full room rate for not turning up!

Now that is briliant. In a sleazy scumbag way, of course, but it’s still brilliant.

Out Of Stock

Posted: Tue 24 October, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Letters | Leave a comment »

Over the weekend I got an email from Marks and Spencer advertising their new range for big wide bastards (not quite the way they phrased it, but that’s what they meant) that was currently only available on-line. It’s a range that interests me – hey, I definitely qualify as a big wide bastard – so I had a look.

Surprisingly, there were a couple of things I liked the look of, so I ordered them through the site. All well and good.

Last night I got an email…

Dear Lyle,
Thanks for your recent online order.
  I am sorry to tell you that we have had to cancel [one of the items] from your order as they are currently out of stock. You have not been charged for these items and your new order total is £xx.xx. I understand that this information will bedisappointing and I’m sorry for any inconvenience that it will cause you.
  The remaining items on your order will be delivered within the next 4-7 working days.
  We update availability regularly, so you may wish to check the website again in the next 2-3 weeks however, if these items were part of a sale we will not receive any more stock. If you would like to order an alternative product please call us on [I can’t be arsed to give the number]
  Thanks for shopping with Marks & Spencer Online.
  Kind Regards,
Customer Services, Marks & Spencer, www.marksandspencer.com

My response wasn’t quite so polite…

Dear Customer Services,
  Thank you for your email.
  Personally, I would rather have been given the choice of whether I wanted the items removed from the order, or held for when the items came into stock. So many thanks for giving me that option.
  Actually, I’d *far* rather have had the website not even show the items that were out of stock – or even at least to *say* the items were out of stock, and would be delayed. I find it hard to believe that a company like M&S can’t organise that kind of integration between warehouse and website. However, it’s obvious that they can’t.
  I think it’s even worse for the company to hold the attitude of “you ordered it, wecan’t provide it, so hey, why don’t you come back in a month or so and see if we’ve managed to get our fingers out or not“. Surely if you have this order listed as “out-of-stock” in the system, it’s not *that* much of a leap to then mail customers when the stock becomes available again, so they can order/re-order.
  As it is though, congratulations, you’ve lost a customer for M&S online. I’ll go back to using Cotton Traders, who at least have the competence/systems to say “that’s out of stock, you can’t order it” on their website.
  Sincerely
  Lyle

Recorded Delivery

Posted: Tue 24 October, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Thoughts | Leave a comment »

Ten days ago, I sent a letter to the scumbag bandits at Holmes Place via Royal Mail‘s “Signed For” service. (“Signed For” being the dumbed-down name for “Recorded Delivery”) Basically, I wanted to know that Holmes Place had received the letter and cheque – not an unreasonable concept, really – and I wanted to be able to check online when it’d been received. And Royal Mail emphasise that you can use their “Track and Trace” online system to check that an item has been delivered.

Only, well, you can’t. It’s been ten days now, and still all I see when I key in the Track and Trace number is

Come back later
Recorded Signed For™ items are only tracked after the item has been delivered. Depending on whether the item was sent first or second class, this may be a few days after posting. Please try again later.

Information on your item is not yet available online.

So frankly, what fucking use is that as a service?

Breakfasts

Posted: Sun 22 October, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Customer Services, Thoughts, Weirdness | Leave a comment »

Over the last month, I’ve been in a selection of different hotels and B&Bs, and one thing I’ve noticed is the sheer difference in quality that’s around. However, there’s also a weird little equation that seems to keep on coming up – it’s not just in the last month I’ve noticed this, but over the last rumty tumty years.

The more a hotel is per night, the poorer the breakfast is

I still don’t really understand how this works out, but I know that the cheapest B&B I’ve used is the one with the best breakfast – and the one that cost me the most was easily the worst. (And yes, that was the one with the watery scrambled eggs)

Very odd.

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