Boycott Voice Mail and Poor Customer Service!

I think it is laziness and greed that have led to this problem, which seems to be mostly an American problem. Customer service seems to be more highly regarded outside of the Americas.

I have started a campaign to restore the customer service in business. First, I always insist on speaking with a human (unless there is a really good reason not to, such as checking the balance on an account or an order status.) If you can’t find a button to push to get a human, try not pushing any. Sometimes this gets you to an operator. Insist on speaking with a human, or at least on getting the direct telephone number of a human. Frequently this is harder than it seems at first. Some companies have NO listed telephone numbers, or only numbers that lead to voice mail or brain-dead telephone jockeys. DON’T ACCEPT THIS! One way to get service is to search out the investor data for a company (company profiles, etc...) You can usually find the name and/or telephone number of "Investor Relations", or of an executive. These folks most likely won’t be able to solve your problem, but they usually care enough to get you in contact with a human who will!

Also, never accept a telephone policy that differs from an Internet policy when an Internet site won’t cooperate. Egghead.Com is an example of such a site. Seems they tried to cram too much stuff onto one page. Either you can’t read it, or it locks up on you when you place an order. Usually it works OK, but not always. If you call Egghead with an order because their website was not working correct DON’T let them put a surcharge on your order! They will tell you that it is their policy surcharge telephone orders (when I called, they wanted an extra $6.00!) DO NOT ACCEPT THIS! Demand that they charge the same as on their website. After all, you could not place the order due to technical problems caused by their website design. I had to speak very firmly to several supervisors before getting this fee waived. Egghead is only one example of this. A number of companies have similar policies.

Websites with no means of contact are more the majority than the minority these days. Take "Yahoo" an "Excite" for instance. Everyone uses these websites, but few seem to care that there is no way to contact ANYONE from either company! Yahoo and Excite are free to commit any business sins, to provide any garbage that they want on their website, and never receive any negative comments! They can’t! They don’t have any means of feedback. Frankly, I am getting sick of the stupid Excite pop-up window that demands that you become a part of their community! All I want is to use their stupid search engine! There is a box that says to click it and the window will never come up again. Yeah, right! Always seems to come right back a couple of days later. I have yet to find anyone to complain to (not really the biggest thing on my mind at the moment.)

Many commercial and commerce sites do the same thing. Take HDTV for instance. There are many websites relating to HDTV, all of which show it to be a very positive thing that has come upon us all. In reality, HDTV is a crappy half-assed solution to a complex technological problem. The technology is not nearly ready for consumer use, yet it is a godsend. Why? Simply because none of the websites offers a means of communication! They offer no feedback form, no EMAIL and no mailing address! Not even those sites belonging to major worldwide corporations! Must be a good thing, they say, we have received no complaints! Of course they haven’t. They can’t!

Track these sleazy operators down and demand better service! The fact is, they are too cheap, greedy, or scared to provide the necessary support. Well folks, if a company can’t afford to provide customer service, then they don’t deserve to be in business and don’t deserve our support, no matter how good the product.

If you are having problems reaching a human at a business or at a website, let us know. We’ll see if we can track down someone who cares and put some customer service back into that company! Just send us some feedback and we’ll be glad to help, but DON’T let them get away with a lack of support!

Andrew M. Shecktor

September, 1999