Horrible Customer Service

The sister thread to this one:
http://home.eyesonff.com/general-cha...customers.html


Most of my customer service stories are along the line of "They put a tomato slice on my burger even though I asked for them to cut the tomato."

However, I do have two stories of horrible customer service.

The first was with Playstation CS. I had just purchased the entire first season of Korra on PSN and along with the show had about $100 worth of videos on my playstation.

The chat tech had me reset my system, deleting all of my saves and games. I redownloaded all of my saves fine, but they refused to reauthorize my video downloads, so all of my movies (some that I hadn't finished) are forever gone.
I requested a re-authorization 2 more times and both times they pretty much just laughed at me.

My second story was actually at a place that I worked, a barbecue restaurant. My shift ended, so I went home and later came back to get some food for my family. I placed my order and watched as dozens of orders behind mine were filled over the next hour and a half. I asked what the hold up was, and my boss told me that they were giving everyone else their food first because I worked there and I could wait.

I quit the next day.


What horrible tales of terrible calamity do you have from the receiving end of customer service?

I've yet to be on the receiving end of any terrible customer service beyond, say, policy issues which are 100% out of the service worker's control.

Those poor guys have got to deal with people yelling at them all day for stuff that isn't their fault. I sympathize with them too much to ever get angry.

This is only the most recent incident of many.

7/1: contact Comcast, tell them I'm moving on 7/13. They say "ok, $10 for nothing please as a transfer fee, everything will stop at your old address and start at the new one that day.

7/13: service stops at old address. Go to new address, deal with "Activation" hassle, service works.

7/28: service stops at new address and goes to "Activation."

7/28: talk to tech support, they (by "they" I mean the mouthpiece tech, since I could hear their manager instructing them) said they can't help, talk to "activation services." Activation services is closed and only open when I'm at work.

7/28: talk to tech support again, they say "oh, actually, talk to our '"moving department' because your old account is closed but your new one has no services"

7/28: talk to moving services. They say that they can't help because old account is closed, to talk to Activation.

7/29: during my work hours, talk to Activation. They say they can't help, talk to "account specialist."

7/29: talk to account specialist. They say they can't help, wait a second while they find a sales rep.

7/29: talk to sales rep, who hasn't heard any of this story. Explain the problem for the nth time. They say "sure, I'll fix it, no charges" and service works.

8/5: get bill, it has modem lease added to it (I have no equipment of theirs), and a $50 "new service" charge in addition to a $10 "transfer service" charge.

8/6: talk to billing, they refund the obviously fabricated modem charge, but the other is too large, so they can't refund it. Escalation created.

8/6: WAITING. FOR GOD'S SAKE COMCAST, THIS WAS A SIMPLE TRANSFER.

^ Comcast is the absolute pits and I hate them with a passion.

Okay, my service got cut off 'cuz I could no longer afford it - great. Fine. I only had super basic cable and cable internet or whatever.
However, they sent a technician at like 10 p.m. on a Wednesday night to get the modem... I was living by myself with a baby. And you think I'm gonna open my door for you? Please. Like there really was a thing happening in Nashville (maybe other places, too) where people were pretending to be Comcast techs - even had similar outfits and fake IDs and stuff and they would just rob people. The guy called me and I told him like straight up, I'm not going to answer the door for him, I don't know who he is and it's waaaay too late for him to even be there. He left a note on my door like saying he would hook my cable back up if I just gave him the modem. And then kept calling me for a week about it.

And then like. Okay, I'm a server, I'm a friendly one - I talk to everybody, but if I see a chick has the potential to get jelly and possessive, I'll leave her dude pretty much alone and like be nice to her and chat -her- up. And if anything I kind of try to give the girl more attention 'cuz bitches be crazy.

So.. 2x at the same restaurant - waaay different locations with 2 different people, the same damn thing happened. Like, I don't care if a server talks to my dude or gets chatty or whatever, but when you start ignoring me altogether and get -his- refills and extra napkins for -him- (especially when he needs neither & didn't even ask), then we have a problem. I think I've told this story, but I'd ordered something pretty spicy and needed a water refill. Chick goes and brings back a sweet tea pitcher for my ex, but no water for me. It took her another 30 minutes to get me a refill.

Then in Texarkana, my bf & I went to this place. The chick had zero personality and then didn't even really know the menu but acted like I was stupid when I asked a question. Her section wasn't even full, yet someone else walked her food to us and it was cold. I ate it anyway 'cuz whatevs. I'm not that picky and I try not to complain much. But then, once again, I needed a refill and asked for one, but instead she brought my BF a whole new glass of sweet tea and he didn't need it. I still left a decent tip (less than the 25 - 30% I normally leave, but still decent, but instead of complaining directly to a manager, I just wrote a note on the back and told her that the service was crap and she really didn't deserve what we left her. We saw her from outside read it and shove it deep in her apron. I assume she zeroed out the tip on the PC and claimed to have lost it so she wouldn't get in trouble.

And then Bank of America tried to screw me out of nearly $1,000, but that's a long story.

Comcast is troutty. We've had to contact them multiple times to come fix our wiring since they didn't come the first few times we called them. Our Internet was on and off for almost a whole month while we waited for them to show up, only to call them again and keep waiting.

I really had to struggle to come up with an example, as I don't really go out enough to be a customer very often, and when I have, I 9 out of 10 times have been treated well.

I don't count over-the-phone stuff or internet stuff, because for it to be "horrible," I'd really have to have been looked in the eye and told to shove off for no reason. I can understand someone not being able to visualize a voice or simple text as a human being, but if I'm standing right in front of you and you treat me like crap, that's horrible customer service, in my eyes.

So what happened was that I was buying cigarettes at a gas station when I was up in my hometown for...I guess it was a birthday party, or something? I was a few cents shy, and the little "penny dish" had enough to cover it, but it was out of reach. I asked if the cashier would mind taking from there, and she told me something along the lines of "that's only for when people need it to make change," or something.

I didn't want to cuss her out, because that would've been rude, but I remember exactly what I told her:

"That seems arbitrary and needlessly procedural."

I went outside, bummed a quarter off my dad, got my smokes and left.

Kind of minor, actually, but it was all I could come up with.

I have not had terrible customer service experiences as of yet. I guess up to this point the only terrible things that have happen to me personally is getting my orders messed up when I go to pick up something at a fast food place.

I did recently made an online purchase where the state of the contents I received are not what I expected. I have only 48 hours to contact the seller and arrange a return/refund, I hope that goes well because their refund policies are bit restrictive.

Spuuky left out the part where a Comcast technician came to our house to activate services that were already active.

I spent literally the better part of two years trying to file a goddamned change of address with one of my pension plans.

Said plan only had like $50 in it (it was opened for me by a job I had for a very short time), but needless to say, these morons don't handle any of my money anymore.

Best Buy chains around my parts avoid customers like the plague.

It actually takes a lot to frustrate me when it comes to customer service. Since I've worked a few different jobs in the service industry (and one in detail) I always like to believe that when I'm getting poor service, it's because that person is busy or struggling. They might be new, or have a ton of orders, or they could just be having a really bad night.

The only thing I don't put up well with is rudeness. I'm NEVER rude to customers. I am the best customer, really. I'm polite, friendly, chatty (but not overtly so), and I'm really hard to upset if things are going slow or a mistake was made. We're all human. It's okay. But if you're rude to me, I WILL say something to your manager. I don't care how bad of a night you're having, unless I'm a troutty customer, there's no reason to be rude to me.

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Originally Posted by Tifa's Boobs

The only thing I don't put up well with is rudeness. I'm NEVER rude to customers. I am the best customer, really. I'm polite, friendly, chatty (but not overtly so), and I'm really hard to upset if things are going slow or a mistake was made. We're all human. It's okay. But if you're rude to me, I WILL say something to your manager. I don't care how bad of a night you're having, unless I'm a troutty customer, there's no reason to be rude to me.

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I'd sympathize with this if people weren't outright wrong about what constitutes "rudeness."

I can't even count the number of frivolous complaints I see from people (usually elderly people) complaining about how whatever employee was "rude" to them when really they were simply distracted by something else, talking to another person, or even just doing their job correctly and as instructed.

People think that other people are being "rude" much more than people are actually being rude. Rudeness requires a certain level of intent, and you can't judge that very often, and I wish people would stop trying. Assume that everything said and done is said and done in the way that is most beneficial interpretation, not the way that is the most offensive possible interpretation.

I've been a server. I know what's distraction, and I know what's rude.

I had a horrible service experience at a Saltgrass Steakhouse the other night.

We were taking my sister out for our birthday. The waiter was one of the worst I've ever experienced. He walked away, twice after we'd ordered an item but before we had finished. He was unhelpful and uncommunicative in general.

And, after we'd asked to be moved to another table (because there was a table right behind us that was extremely, and I do mean extremely, loud), we caught him talking about us to other customers. Which is just... No. You do not do that.

There were other little things throughout the night, but really, that one server pretty much torpedoed his chances at a tip (which we wrote out in triplicate on the check why he wasn't getting one), and ensured we'd never go to that Saltgrass again.

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Originally Posted by Tifa's Boobs

I've been a server. I know what's distraction, and I know what's rude.

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Sure, you might, most of the time. Most people who complain about "rudeness" don't. If I see complaints about "rudeness" i'm pretty dismissive of them, because they're usually wrong. It isn't "rude" to tell someone about company policy, for instance, or to ask another employee a question while assisting a guest, or to "not cheerfully smile the whole time" or many of the other flagrantly stupid complaints I have seen.

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Originally Posted by Spuuky

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Originally Posted by Tifa's Boobs

I've been a server. I know what's distraction, and I know what's rude.

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Sure, you might, most of the time. Most people who complain about "rudeness" don't. If I see complaints about "rudeness" i'm pretty dismissive of them, because they're usually wrong. It isn't "rude" to tell someone about company policy, for instance, or to ask another employee a question while assisting a guest, or to "not cheerfully smile the whole time" or many of the other flagrantly stupid complaints I have seen.

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Ah, yeah. I see why you would dismiss those complaints. I guess that managers really have no way to know this about me, but I've only complained three, maybe four times ever. Like I said before--I try to be a really good customer. I may ask to 86 items from my food, but I'm not that difficult. I don't have all of these rules on how my food's prepared. And generally, if it comes to me incorrect, I'll just pick it off myself. Having been a server, I understand that mistakes happen. A lot of times it's not even your fault. I understand that when you're busy, you're less likely to take personal time with me other than to make sure I have what I need. I generally will go a long time without having my glass refilled if I see you're busy. I try to let my server know everything I want before they walk away to get it (sometimes they don't give me enough time to say everything I want. And buy everything I just mean for example Tabasco sauce and another drink on top of my water), but I do try. In short: I try to be the customer I would want, as I've been in the same position.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I understand when servers are rude to customers who are rude for no reason. But if I'm perfectly pleasant to you, I don't appreciate you snapping at me or acting put out when I ask you for something.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Spuuky

It isn't "rude" to tell someone about company policy, for instance, or to ask another employee a question while assisting a guest, or to "not cheerfully smile the whole time" or many of the other flagrantly stupid complaints I have seen.

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Agreed.

From the Director's Edition of The Wrath of Khan:

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SPOCK
...Remind me to explain to you the concept of the human ego.

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