Friday, July 25, 2008

Another Classic "I don't care' Customer Care Experience.

So, I noticed that the channel programming guide on the cable TV had an error that didn't get fixed after a few days, so I thought I would do the cable company (Who I have high regard for until now) a favour by informing them.
As I don't want to wait on the phone while listening to how important my call is to them, I chose the contact form on the website, and here is the email result, together with my original text:
Hello Mr. xxxxxxxxxxx

Thank you for taking the time to send us your email. We apologize for
the
recent issues you have in countered with your cable service. We will be
happy
to look further into the issues for you if you are still experiencing
the
problems. Please call our cable support department available to assist
you 24
hours a day, by calling 1-888-xxx-xxxx option 4 then option 2.

Thank you,
xxxxxxxxx Customer Care
"It's That Easy"


Please do not reply to this message. If you require further assistance
please click here and you
will be taken back to our main web contact page.

Original Message Details:

First Name: John
Last Name: xxxxxxxxxxx
Email: xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Comment
Comment: Hi, Just to let you know that your digital cable guide is
incorrect for listings of South Park on the Comedy Network - the
descriptions lately do not match the content. Also, the Men channel
breaks up all the time, losing sound and picture so badly that it is
unwatchable. Do I contact the Men TV for this? The problem is perhaps
theirs? My other channels work fine. Have a great day, John
Now, let me translate what they are actually saying:
Dear Mr xxxxxxxx,
I have not fully read your contact form text that you submitted from our website, and so am ignoring that you asked a question.
I am actually trying to just find a way to respond that will not generate further emails that I have to reply to, as I am the email person assigned this week, and I really hate my job. So I have decided to use a template referring you to the phone-in customer care we have. I do it with all the incoming contact form messages, and most customers like yourself are so brain dead that they put up with it.
I have detected from the brief look I gave your text that you are also having technical issues, so, despite you filling out a silly load of personal info text boxes just to submit the contact text (one of which was an alternative phone number that was not marked as being essential to fill out until after trying to submit the form) that actually gives us your full contact information, I prefer for you as a customer to go through the mindless process that you were trying to avoid, namely, phone us and be put on hold and get annoyed by our stupid eternally repeating message telling you a pack of lies about how we value your business, whereas, as you can tell, we don't.
Anyway, this email to you is done, and I am well within my handle time for replying - obviously if I don't actually do any thinking before replying, it makes my job of keeping good personal statistics a lot easier.
Further, by failing to actually respond to what you wrote, I am avoiding a bad personal evaluation that might occur if I made an error in what I advised, this being a likely probability due to me actually knowing nothing at all about the subject in hand.
It was annoying having to write all of this, I prefer to use templates like are used for form letters.
And no, I am not going to contact someone within our company who can actually help - it is up to you to work at contacting us.

Thank you,
Anon Customer Care Person

And finally, here is my response:
Hi, Thanks, but that's Ok, all the info I can give you is in the original note I sent. Your choice what you do with it.
According to my son, the guide has been incorrect for a while now, and as for the Men channel, I just have to not watch it if it has breaking up sound and picture. I will take it up with the Men channel.
Thanks,
John

It came back at me as the address was a noreply one.
So, I have been converted from liking this company and being reasonably satisfied with the service, to being pissed off.
I cannot for the life of me know why they bother having an online contact form if they are not supporting it.
Anyway, screw them. They can boil their heads for all I care. I have better things to do than endlessly chase them to assist them in correcting errors that are probably caused by their own incompetence.
As they say, "It's That Easy"

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