Why has customer service gone to pot lately ?

ScumLord

Where To wrote: »

Well, I am one of the most mannerly people anyone will ever have the pleasure of dealing with I can honestly say that being nice as a customer rarely helps getting anything done.

Bottom line, dress it up any way you want.

People don't give a sh1t about customers.

It's not as simple as that for your average phone support guy, he just can't help you. He works from a script and if your question isn't on that script he can only say sorry and send you off on the phone system merry go round for another spin. As a whole big corporations are only interested in the money and there's a report somewhere telling them the most cost effective way of dismissing customer complaint without annoying too many people.

The only way around this is to vote with your wallet but no bodies prepared to do that in Ireland, as we're so placid companies take advantage.

Furious_George

msg11 wrote: »

No see the thing is regardless I have to help them, if there attitude changes while dealing with them mine will too.

Do you work in retail can I ask? I think not, if you did you would understand. We deal with some of the most rudest people in our society.

And if your thinking I am only a prick , well on the way home from my shift off the clock, me and my friend noticed one guy pushing a car, flat battery, we offered to help push and got him going. So going on that I take pride in my job and company, but I cannot stand people looking down on me because ' I pack shelves in a shop ' and you can tell these people from lack of manners. The demanding I want it now, trying to tell me I am wrong when I say we don't stock a product.

You are clearly not a prick and I can see your point in some respects but when working in retail you generally have to be professional and polite, regardless of whether the customer is polite or not. It's part of what you are paid to do.
Customer: "Hey you, where are the egg?"
Me: Smiling,"Just over here sir, follow me" all the while imagining what the inside of their head look like.

That only stands if they are rude, if abusive then all bets are off because no one is paid to be insulted, well apart from bouncers (not meant as an insult more a comment on the **** they are paid and expected to put up with). I worked in retail for years, and a brief stint waiting tables, and a longer stint in pubs so I know the frustration dealing with pricks. Unfortunately that's the name of the game.

shopaholic01

The only customer service problem I've had was with Eircom. Whenever I called I was told I had the wrong department, was given another number and the process was repeated. Took 3 weeks to sort out a minor issue.


I moved to another company and was bombarded with calls trying to get me to change back. Cue repeatedly asking to be removed from their marketing list. I had to threaten to contact ComReg if it persisted.

Now I have sales people calling to my door assuring me that was 'old Eircom' and that 'new Eircom' are marvellous. One of them even lied to me about a broadband upgrade, which he claimed I could only get with Eircom. Quick call to my own provider, and lo and behold, they could upgrade my service using the 'next generation lines only available to Eircom':rolleyes:.

Now I just close the door when I see them - ignorant I know, but it's the only thing that works.

Logical_Bear

Rabidlamb wrote: »

The router slowly died, nobody broke it.
They were continuing to charge us for broadband that we couldn't receive due to their faulty hardware.

Its actually your hardware and again why should they replace it when its out of warranty??

ScumLord

Logical_Bear wrote: »

Its actually your hardware and again why should they replace it when its out of warranty??

It should make sense for them to replace it as you can't access their service without one but as you're tied into a 12 month contract they can just tell you to go fup yourself.

Although when that contract is up they'll beg and plead and offer you as many routers as you want to stay with them.

Madam_X

Poor money, poor training, not caring about the job (a lot of the time it's just a stopgap) and on the other side of the coin: a lack of personal responsibility, shocking sense of entitlement, and terrible stupidity among many customers; a view a lot of the time of "bad customer service" when it isn't actually, it's just stuff they don't want to hear. There are customers who literally think it's bad form for a company to tell them they owe money for a product they knowingly use - no word of a lie. Or that data protection compliance is poor service.

Personally, when I was on the phones, I cared a hell of a lot about good customer service, so I did my very best - and more, but if someone was being a rotten bullying pig, I'd simply go through the motions.

Gummy Panda

I didn't under the bad customer service complaints in Irish companies till I dealt with UPC. Eircom aren't much better.

Teyla Emmagan

One word (well, two) - Greyhound Recycling. Nice as pie to your face, rubbish (no pun intended) actual service. And one of their customer promises is some guff about being polite to you on the phone - never mind being polite! PICK UP MY FRICKIN RUBBISH I have called you 13 times already!!!!

I hates them.

Corruptedmorals

I am always polite and being nice definitely helps, people who bark at customers get abuse back. But for every 5 nice customers, there is someone rude or someone who doesn't believe you, someone who acts like the sales assistant made the store policies out of spite, someone who is so special they don't have to queue or abide by fitting room limits, plenty of who are so ignorant they walk through you and of course, people who roar abuse because they can't get a refund without a receipt. Not only do a sizeable proportion of the population look down on and treat staff like ****, they also treat the stock and store like **** too.

Snowie

Ive come to enjoy invoicing compnays for wasting my time they soon start treating you with the correct amount of respect!

UCDVet

To be perfectly honest, a lot of the time it's not really a customer service problem. It's a business decision.

They have some business analyst or accountant that looks at their numbers and says, 'We spent 400k last year on free router replacements'. They see that as a cost. And they aren't legally obligated to replace the routers in 99% of those cases. So they want to reduce that cost.

So, they train their phone support folk (who are reading a script) to tell you that they can't replace it and to call/mail/harass the manufacturer. They know, statistically, virtually nobody is going to leave (after all, you probably have a contract anyway). They also know you *can* get it sorted via the manufacturer, or like the original poster said, buy his own used router.

I'd bet that, in 80-90% of the cases, the customer just gets annoyed and deals with it. In the other 20-10% if the customer is really fighting for it, they'll back down and send out a router. Now instead of spending 400k they spend 80k and some rich guy gets a bigger bonus because he saved the company 320k.

Madam_X

UCDVet wrote: »

To be perfectly honest, a lot of the time it's not really a customer service problem. It's a business decision.

Absolutely. It's just easier to whinge "Bad customer service" and blame the easy target of the 20-year-old on the phone at 10pm on a Friday night earning minimum wage.
Sometimes what's construed as rudeness and a lack of co-operation is neither - it's simply the advisor's hands being tied.

Monty - the one and only

Having worked in the industry both in Ireland and abroad for years, "the customer is always right" is a downright lie. More often than not the customer lies to get what they want.

Can be amusing to get the ones that are yelling just because they can, to trip over their own lies.

Sure there are idiots in customer service out there...But the same is true for customers aswell, though unless you've worked in the industry your unlikely to know that, that number is oddly high per day of calls.

Sala

If you work in customer service it's usually the moaners you spend your time dealing with. Putting up with moaners while on minimum wage working for a company that make millions in profit and pays your overlords x10 what you make makes people miserable. That's my theory anyway. It's what makes small businesses great; they all feel they have a genuine role to play and take pride in what they do, rather than being 1 in 1000 totally replaceable customer service agents

KungPao

I worked for Smyth's Toys for years. I was at least the best employee they ever had

Used to sell bikes n sh*t like a boss, and face sh*t off like a master.

Good times.

Shryke

KungPao wrote: »

I worked for Smyth's Toys for years. I was at least the best employee they ever had

Used to sell bikes n sh*t like a boss, and face sh*t off like a master.

Good times.

The bikes lane was for dossers. Easiest job in the shop. I bet you couldn't pack down or run the desk to save your life!

Davyhal

shopaholic01 wrote: »

The only customer service problem I've had was with Eircom. Whenever I called I was told I had the wrong department, was given another number and the process was repeated. Took 3 weeks to sort out a minor issue.


I moved to another company and was bombarded with calls trying to get me to change back. Cue repeatedly asking to be removed from their marketing list. I had to threaten to contact ComReg if it persisted.

Now I have sales people calling to my door assuring me that was 'old Eircom' and that 'new Eircom' are marvellous. One of them even lied to me about a broadband upgrade, which he claimed I could only get with Eircom. Quick call to my own provider, and lo and behold, they could upgrade my service using the 'next generation lines only available to Eircom':rolleyes:.

Now I just close the door when I see them - ignorant I know, but it's the only thing that works.

Eircom are notorious alright. I have friends who have worked there before. Apparently in customer service, there is a certain length of time (think it is actually only like 90 seconds or something) that the call is meant to last, and if it goes on any longer than that, the staff are penalised. Totally wrong attitude on the company's part

T-K-O

Every time I have a problem with my phone, TV, Utility bill etc and I am forced to use their call centre, the experience is so bad it inspires me to change supplier


...but then I realise they are all as bad as each other. It's quite depressing

OneArt

What irritated me about Ireland was that when I worked in restaurants, I was slated for not smiling. I was always pleasant, even to customers who were complete dicks. Some days I would just be tired or run down or whatever, but we'd still be forced to be as pleasant and nice as possible.

Yet whenever I went into restaurants, bars or had to deal with customer service, the people working were almost always c*nts. How come they get to be and I don't? Grr.

T-K-O

OneArt wrote: »

What irritated me about Ireland was that when I worked in restaurants, I was slated for not smiling. I was always pleasant, even to customers who were complete dicks. Some days I would just be tired or run down or whatever, but we'd still be forced to be as pleasant and nice as possible.

Yet whenever I went into restaurants, bars or had to deal with customer service, the people working were almost always c*nts. How come they get to be and I don't? Grr.

Sounds like you are not cut out for the job. For the same reasons I would never work in that area.

Madam_X

I'm or have been a customer of AIB, Vodafone, Sky, UPC, Three, Bord Gais, ESB, VHI, among others and I had one bad experience with UPC which in fairness they rectified very well and apologised, and two with Vodafone, which was human error - can happen.

I know some companies have a bad reputation (Three - although I was lucky with them; Airtricity) but if a person is a serial customer service complainer re pretty much every company they deal with, then maybe they need to look at themselves rather than just the company.

krudler

Madam_X wrote: »

I'm or have been a customer of AIB, Vodafone, Sky, UPC, Three, Bord Gais, ESB, VHI, among others and I had one bad experience with UPC which in fairness they rectified very well and apologised, and two with Vodafone, which was human error - can happen.

I know some companies have a bad reputation (Three - although I was lucky with them; Airtricity) but if a person is a serial customer service complainer re pretty much every company they deal with, then maybe they need to look at themselves rather than just the company.

This, some people seem to have constant issues with everything, that doesn't happen by coincidence.

T-K-O

Energia deserve a mention and its not positive...

I'll say no more for fear of a lifetime ban

Gummy Panda

Madam_X wrote: »

I'm or have been a customer of AIB, Vodafone, Sky, UPC, Three, Bord Gais, ESB, VHI, among others and I had one bad experience with UPC which in fairness they rectified very well and apologised, and two with Vodafone, which was human error - can happen.

I know some companies have a bad reputation (Three - although I was lucky with them; Airtricity) but if a person is a serial customer service complainer re pretty much every company they deal with, then maybe they need to look at themselves rather than just the company.

The contrast of customer service between some Irish companies is amazing. I expect race to the bottom companies to have poor customer care but some of the more expensive companies have awful care.

Hippies!

Rabidlamb wrote: »

Why has customer service gone to pot lately ?

Customer service always had an issue with employees smoking pot. It's the students I blame.

Qualitymark

I mostly have pretty nice interactions with customer service, but there are some exceptions.

Rang 'Electric Ireland' last week. The little brat who answered the phone had exactly the passive-aggressive, nasty attitude of the woman in the No Nonsense Insurance ad - and the same nasal accent (where's that accent from?) He wouldn't deal with me at all unless he had my meter number (I'm not a customer), my address, my surname, my first name - at this stage I put down the phone and rang another firm, who were pleasant and helpful.

The worst ever, the all-time record-holders, were Palm - does the company still exist? I loved my Palm T1 personal organiser, used it for writing, and for everything I now use my ancient iPhone for. But the 'help' staff were so incredibly, extraordinarily rude and bullying that as soon as I could, I switched to another maker.

Apple were varied - sometimes you'd get a jobsworth, sometimes someone really nice and good and helpful. I discovered early on that if I had happened on to a jobsworth, the thing to do was say "What...what.... hello...? hello...?" and hang up, and ring back later, until I'd get someone good. Also works for other firms.

What amazes me is that there don't seem to be mystery shoppers checking up on how good the phone staff are in companies. Boy, would they find out about how their services are being sold.

Madam_X

The Electric Ireland guy probably insisted on those details because he is told to though, rather than deliberately being unhelpful. Seems unnecessary all right but from my experience if you can proceed with the call you will - because putting up barriers to the customer is not fun for the agent either.

PC CDROM

A lot of it is all about money.

I never get people ringing up about minor "cost" issues but when the repair is into the 100's all of a sudden its a "manufactures defect"

Really? Do you not think if that was the case it might have reared its head sometime earlier in the last seven years you owned the vehicle?

Also people using dodgy Diesel in vehicles is the bane of my life. Thousands to fix when the injector jams open and blows the sh1te out of an engine

Though the painful part is people didn't necessarily know it was dodgy Diesel in the first place

krudler

Madam_X wrote: »

The Electric Ireland guy probably insisted on those details because he is told to though, rather than deliberately being unhelpful. Seems unnecessary all right but from my experience if you can proceed with the call you will - because putting up barriers to the customer is not fun for the agent either.

"Sorry but I need to speak to the account holder"
"But I'm his wife/husband!"
"Oh I'm sorry, yeah I forgot being married exempts you from data protection laws, silly me"

Madam_X

"Dats turrbl customer serrrrrvice I must say."

"No, it would be terrible customer service if I divulged the details of your husband's account to you."

Qualitymark

Madam_X wrote: »

The Electric Ireland guy probably insisted on those details because he is told to though, rather than deliberately being unhelpful. Seems unnecessary all right but from my experience if you can proceed with the call you will - because putting up barriers to the customer is not fun for the agent either.

Not from his tone. He was obviously satisfied to be able to demand details from me rather than answering the rather simple question I'd rung up to ask. A clone of the No Nonsense Insurance woman.

And what is that accent?

Vicxas

A lot of the problem stems from usually HO edicts being handed down.

Back in the good days companies were a lot more lax about policy as it made them money and made customers happy.

Now its all about cost saving and doing whats best for the company rather than the customer. So dont have a go at the people on the end of the phone, their hands are tied to the sh!tty company policy.

Chucky the tree

Rabidlamb wrote: »

Also, I'm a bit of a c*nt & tend to be rash in these situations.

That's why you get **** service and people that deal with you treat you like the **** that you admit you are. Nearly everyone in customer service will tell you that the customers who act likes tossers are the least likely to get what they want.

ArtyC

Where To wrote: »

Although you are joking (I think), this is sadly a very common attitude. Not all customers are *****, but they generally turn into ***** if that's how you treat them.

Not all staff are *****, but they generally turn into *****...... You know what I'm getting to

Gummy Panda

krudler wrote: »

"Sorry but I need to speak to the account holder"
"But I'm his wife/husband!"
"Oh I'm sorry, yeah I forgot being married exempts you from data protection laws, silly me"

In fairness, a lot of people don't understand the data protection act and consequences of breaking it.

irishgirl19

I work in customer service and I can tell you, some of the customers are downright rude who are screaming as soon as you pick up the phone. As others have said, demanding the unrealistic.

Customers who want to speak to a manager for every single little thing, like things that can be dealt with by my colleagues and I, and when you say no every single one of them says oh your refusing to let me speak to a manager, when actually it is an issue that can't be escalated for example customers saying im disconnected its a disgrace and I want a supervisor......you haven't paid your bill in four months!!!!!eughhh

Qualitymark

The customers who are screaming at the unfortunate staff the second they pick up the phone have quite possibly been waiting and pressing 1 and pressing 3 and pressing 2 and pressing 5 and saying "agent" and hearing "I didn't understand that, can you repeat..." and pressing 1 and pressing 5 for 10 minutes before they actually got to speak to a human.

Those machines!

irishgirl19

Davyhal wrote: »

Eircom are notorious alright. I have friends who have worked there before. Apparently in customer service, there is a certain length of time (think it is actually only like 90 seconds or something) that the call is meant to last, and if it goes on any longer than that, the staff are penalised. Totally wrong attitude on the company's part

thats not true

Gummy Panda

irishgirl19 wrote: »

thats not true

Probably a call board though. Most call centres have them to show the level of calls on hold so agent knows to not dwindle on the phone.

krudler

Qualitymark wrote: »

The customers who are screaming at the unfortunate staff the second they pick up the phone have quite possibly been waiting and pressing 1 and pressing 3 and pressing 2 and pressing 5 and saying "agent" and hearing "I didn't understand that, can you repeat..." and pressing 1 and pressing 5 for 10 minutes before they actually got to speak to a human.

Those machines!

then use email, facebook, boards, twitter etc etc to contact them? most big companies have multiple ways of getting an issue handled these days. The reason companies use self service ivrs is otherwise nobody would ever get through, you'd have every customer ringing through to an agent.

Qualitymark

krudler wrote: »

then use email, facebook, boards, twitter etc etc to contact them? most big companies have multiple ways of getting an issue handled these days. The reason companies use self service ivrs is otherwise nobody would ever get through, you'd have every customer ringing through to an agent.

Actually, no. I don't personally like using customer service numbers; before that Electric Ireland call I'd emailed them - and got a callback who left a message telling me to call the 1890 or 1850 number.

Jay D

Rabidlamb wrote: »

Smyths Toys wouldn't replace a broken belt clip on a new buggy, I relieved them of the replacement from a store display model instead.

So people jump to criticise you, yet effectively they were going to rob you to begin with.

People, kindly go fúck yourselves

Back when most shops were small businesses, it was easier to please people. A customer wants something ordered in? Order it. A customer has a complaint with an item? Give them a return and a discount on a new one. Someone wants to complain about how things are done? Listen to their complaint and sort it out for them. But all these things require the power to act on your own opinion or easy access to someone who can. The ability to use your discretion.

In businesses these days that's near impossible. When I'm behind a till, with an angry queue of 10 people and no one to cover me while I go get the manager, I can hardly show someone where the eggs are. When the manager's been in the office all day and I haven't seen the boss in weeks, I can't get someone a discount on a fixed price item just because they think the price isn't fair. Nor can I answer the question "but WHY does it cost that much?". When tills are automated and require a barcode in order to process an item, I can't just let you skip the queue and throw me a euro for your Evening Herald. I'll deal with all these people as best I can, with a smile on my face no matter what they say to me, and apologies at the ready even when they're in the wrong. And still they'll treat me like dirt, even when I've done things that could lose me my job to try to please them.

Customer services haven't changed. People opt for chain stores and big businesses and still expect a personal service. No matter how nice an employee is, or how desperately they want to send you away happy, there are many things that as a low level worker in a big business, they just can't do for you. There are people than can help, but customers refuse to go to the appropriate person unless you personally redirect them.

irishgirl19

Gummy Panda wrote: »

Probably a call board though. Most call centres have them to show the level of calls on hold so agent knows to not dwindle on the phone.

Where I am we aim for an average 5 min call talktime. Its very easy to average this out during the week even with very long calls for 45mins coming in to so its alright to get the balance. They are generally ok where I am if it is a little bit over after all if you have to do something that takes ages to fix a problem then what can ya do

suicide_circus

The problem with so called "poor customer service" is that when most people make a mistake, don't read the small print or generally don't get their way when dealing with a company, they call it poor customer service, even when it's completely their own fault.

I deal with customers everyday. If someone is decent with me i will do my best for them. If someone is very pissed off but dosnt take it out on me, i will do my best for them. If they get aggressive, snotty, condescending or abusive i will go out of my way to pissed them off and delay them.

Gummy Panda

suicide_circus wrote: »

The problem with so called "poor customer service" is that when most people make a mistake, don't read the small print or generally don't get their way when dealing with a company, they call it poor customer service, even when it's completely their own fault.

Thats true but a lot of companies don't look inwards and just accept their procedures when they are actually customer unfriendly.

Gummy Panda

UPC defo has to be worst for customer service. I rang them three weeks ago about a moving home order.

now they keep saying they're trying to release services into the area even though I have a UPC branded outlet on the wall. I connected tv to it last week and get basic package. Upc reps say they're trying to release services into area.

Connect digital box to it today and I'm getting full digital package I had even though I was told engineers are still working to connect me.

Qualitymark

Gummy Panda wrote: »

UPC defo has to be worst for customer service. I rang them three weeks ago about a moving home order.

now they keep saying they're trying to release services into the area even though I have a UPC branded outlet on the wall. I connected tv to it last week and get basic package. Upc reps say they're trying to release services into area.

Connect digital box to it today and I'm getting full digital package I had even though I was told engineers are still working to connect me.

Maybe it varies? I've had really lovely and helpful services seometimes from UPC. Not for TV - apparently their TV service isn't so good - but for net.

otto_26

gobnaitolunacy wrote: »

It seems to be sh1t in this country, generally.

In Australia, 99% people serving at counters were pleasant, rather than being annoyed at being woken up from their nap here.

Edit: Is 'relieved' code for nicked?
Nice.

That's because in Australia they pay people properly not like the greedy companies in Ireland. If I'm working in Australia on 20 dollars an hour in some crappy job of course I'm going to smile!

Why would I smile in Ireland when I know I can't afford to do anything after work cause I'm paid so badly while the company I work for makes millions!

mandrake04

otto_26 wrote: »

That's because in Australia they pay people properly not like the greedy companies in Ireland. If I'm working in Australia on 20 dollars an hour in some crappy job of course I'm going to smile!

Mate if I was getting $20 an hour for a crappy job I wouldn't be smiling, $20 p/h is absolute rubbish. FFS I lose more in tax.