Although Comcast did eventually fix the problem, apologize, and credit me a month's service to make up for the hassle of giving away my phone number one day for no apparent reason, it was only after I Tweeted and blogged about the two hour customer service support chat from hell. What happens to regular customers who don't have hundreds or thousands of Twitter followers, or who don't have "I write for the San Francisco Chronicle" in their Twitter bio?
Still, their Twitter customer service rep, @ComcastMelissa, was truly awesome, and the people to whom she escalated my problem were extremely fast and helpful. Kudos where they're due.
In contrast, I didn't need to go whining on Twitter to get great customer service from Amazon. I ordered something that didn't arrive, went to their online support chat, and prepared to suffer. This is what happened:
You are now connected to Tyler from Amazon.com.
Me:This was being sent with one day delivery and has never arrived -- it's been almost 2 weeks. I would like it to be re-sent to me, and a refund of the one-day delivery charge. Thanks.4:22:42 PM
Tyler:Hello, Christie, I'm sorry to hear that you haven't received your order. This will take a moment as I bring up the order to assist you.4:23:02 PM
Me:Thanks4:23:08 PM
Tyler:Given that it has been so long, I will arrange for a replacement to be sent to you. In addition, I will be refunding your $3.99 shipping charges. As you currently have a Prime membership, I will also be arranging to extend your prime benefits for an additional month as an apology for this missed delivery.4:25:55 PM
Me:Thanks so much!4:26:08 PM
Tyler:I'll be sending an e-mail to you in the next few minutes confirming that the replacement has been created (as well as this Prime extension). Is there anything else I can assist you with today?
Me:Nothing, this was very fast and helpful, thank you!
Tyler:I'm glad to be of assistance, Christie. Thank you for visiting Amazon.com, we hope to see you again soon!4:26:46 PM
Note this took four minutes. And yes, they'll see me again soon.
Yes. Some businesses truly understand customer service and others just have that monopoly mentality.
For years, before Qwest got online service requests, I hated calling them. You would expect a phone company to have a great calling tree and service reps. Not Qwest - they had the calling tree from hell. After beeping your way into a system that resembled the Matrix, a recording would finally tell you that they were busy and to call back at (and here it would tell you the times and days you were actually calling on) and then hang up on you.
Posted by: Cheryl | 15 October 2010 at 10:09 PM