Archive for the 'Customer satisfaction' Category

I’m on the phone to an agent whilst I’m online. They are trying to help; I cant access any info about my daughter’s phone bills ( in my name) , only a general explanation of how to view a bill. But that’s just part of the story that’s been very familiar with my daughter’s phone over the past few years.

Story so far…Phoned yesterday because the bill is never the £35 that the tariff is supposed to be since we upgraded.

I was told the systems were down and to call back.

Called tonight and got thro options 1 and 4 to billing (not bad by IVR standards!) where I could hardly hear the agent for the background noise, specifically other colleagues talking. (It was Ventura: I asked and she said she’d had complaints today about noise). She couldn’t explain why my daughter’s bill is always higher than the £35 tariff, although identified extras were on the account.

She put me thro to retentions (after a long wait on hold) where he could explain more ie that a free extra granted 2 phones ago had started to be charged for automatically without request or permission. Not happy. A hole in the trust in any company that does that.  They’ve taken the extras off but he can’t backdate the overcharges so I’m now on hold (a very long hold) waiting for customer services so they can backdate the problem.

He’s come back just now and has sorted it with customer services by getting that colleague to fill in the form. Apparently that 3rd colleague will send a text in a day or two to confirm what they’re doing about it. 

He also found why I can’t see my bill online. It is because although it logged me in and accepted me, it hasn’t actually logged me in (useful !). He’s just reset ( changed) the password and username just in case, as it’s a common problem. Now I have to go back in and change it back to what it was, since that’s what I and my daughter have saved in different places.

Now we’re at the point of where I started. What’s the right tariff for my daughter since she’s using a small fraction of what we pay for, despite the fact the bill is higher than the tariff. He’s been able to take us to a lower tariff that meets the need better. Am I confident her bill’s will come through at the tariffed amount? Am I confident that we’ll not get hooked to another 12 months contract?

My other original reason to call was to get home internet changed over as my other daughter has been very pleased with it. I don’t know how long I’d been on the phone (c 30 minutes I think), but I wasn’t going to bother asking another question. And I’m very much less inclined to move our business account to O2 – something I’d asked my PA to look at since our current provider’s network seems to be crumbling (failed calls and connections, “error in connection” being very common; voicemails coming through 24 hours late). It’s such a shame since O2’s word of mouth from my daughter had got them to the top of my list.

Come on O2, you know you want to give your customers the ability to answer the common questions themselves ( I don’t understand my bill, What’s the best tariff for me? ) and staff, outsourced or not, the ability to answer these common queries in one place and take action. I blog this in the hope that it helps you justify some changes because of the business you just lost.

Customer satisfaction, O2 | No Comments

That was the response I had from Carphone Warehouse this morning.

I’m on month 14 of an 18 month contract and yes, I know what a contract means - but over the last few months, having missed some important emails when out and about, I thought I might move up in the world to a Blackberry or XDA. Blackberry have just brought out a girly pink Pearl and since I have girly pink laptop, thought this would do very nicely.

However, even when I offered to consider a penalty, upgrade to a contract more than double the monthly value and lock myself in to them for a further 18 months - the computer said “No”. You can only upgrade when there’s only two months left on the contract.

So if I’m very desperate for a pink Blackberry, or to prove a point, I’ll now have to go and get a contract with someone else and end my contract with Carphone in 3 months time. It must make some good business sense to someone at Carphone - but sending your customers to another supplier when they say “Hello, I’d like to spend more money, for much longer than I intended to” - has never been top of my list of things to do!

Customer satisfaction, dumb things | 1 Comment

Now that the Royal Mail has implemented its ‘Revenue Loss Prevention’ handling charges on any all odd sized, over heavy, under stamped post, it must have stopped quite a few people getting it wrong.

But of course people still make mistakes. Last week we received a note in the mail bundle saying a letter was being held at central post office due to lack of correct postage and no-one in to pay excess. I actually took the mail bundle (we share offices with 6 or 7 other businesses) from the postman that day, and guess what? no mention of excess to pay on any letter.

So I walk to the post office address advised on the form, hand the form over and wait for results. The chap behind the counter had evidently had a bad day. I tried smiling, did not work, tried chatting, did not work. Oh well can’t have everything. Hand over the form, off he goes and comes back with letter. That’s £1.24 he says. I look in my wallet; see I have only a £20 note left. In typically British style I hand it over, apologising that it is all that I have got. The chap behind the counter eyed it dubiously. “Can’t take that, would take all my change, you’ll have to come back tomorrow” with strong undertones of ‘how can you be so stupid as to try and palm off a £20 note, do you think we are running a public service here! So being British, I slink off.

Next day it was back to the post office with lots of loose change in my pocket. Obviously a better day, as really nice cheerful man goes to find the letter. “What security do you need?” I ask. “Just something with your name on it” comes the reply. But the letter is addressed to our business with no mention of my name on it. “Oh that’s OK as we accept anything with a name on it if you are paying excess.

So with thoughts of security rattling through my mind I go back to my office and open the letter. And now comes the real reason for writing this blog –

It was a direct marketing campaign from Monster on line recruitment and they had conveniently forgotten to frank the envelope

So I had wasted at least 1½ hours going to and fro from the post office, it had cost me £1.24 (it’s the principle of the thing) to get a letter that went straight into the recycling box! Miffed, definitely 

So come on Post Office, get your processes right, and make your staff more focused on looking after your customers

And Monster, how many other people have had to pay for your marketing campaigns, is it a ploy to keep your costs down? Not very conducive to make me use your services if you cannot get a mailing right.

Customer satisfaction, customer experience, dumb things | 1 Comment

Having recently joined Budd I wanted to transfer my mobile account from my previous business account, held by Vodafone, into Budd’s business telephone account, also held by Vodafone. Thinking this would be a one call fix, as I was not taking anything away from Vodafone, just changing billing details, I called expecting it to be a simple action. How wrong can you be!

A very polite lady advised me that they would have to send me the PAC number, I asked could it be given over the phone, no, I was told, I had to request the PAC number in writing, an email would do, but it could not be given immediately. She went on to tell me that once Vodafone received my email they could then send me a letter with the PAC number. Could I not receive this information by email I asked?, apologies, but no, this was not the process.

On receiving the letter I was advised, I would then have to send the detail to our internal admin team, who could then call Vodafone, who would then transfer the account billing details. Why, I asked cannot you do this now. Explanation given was that they were on different databases and could not transfer my details but had to go through an internal administrative process to enable another section within Vodafone to handle.

So from a simple request to transfer billing details internally within Vodafone we will generate at least 2 calls and 1 email to Vodafone, 2 internal calls to/from my admin dept, I have received 3 emails so far telling me the PAC number was coming, I have also received a letter from Vodafone with the PAC number and, I think, but I am losing track, there is another letter going to Budd’s admin dept to tell them what to do with it.

By my count that’s around 10 interactions for a piece of internal administration. Why?Surely with the number of people moving between business accounts this process should have been refined by now. Even if the databases do not talk the customer should not see the problem. I understand the need for security, but nothing was said they had to do it this way due to security issues.

So, I’m left a frustrated customer, dreading the day when something really goes wrong. On a high note however, everyone you talk to in Vodafone business team is always friendly and seems to be doing their best. So well done Vodafone business team, just please look at this process and consider how many other processes are frustrating to your customers. Might be time to actually listen to what the customer is saying?

Customer satisfaction, Voice of the Customer, process improvement, reduction in contacts | No Comments