SERVICE DUH.

Last July the contents of my gym locker were stolen. Watch, wallet, pants gone. And my iPhone. Gone.

My experience in the three weeks that followed was a virtual case study in customer service.

My phone company Rogers was close to a disaster in how they handled my predicament. While the people I spoke with were mostly polite, Rogers' policies were abysmal. They had no replacement iPhones for me to buy. They couldn't tell me when I could get one. They refused to give me even a dinky temporary phone. And worst of all, while I had no phone because they couldn't give me one, they refused to freeze my account fees.

I swore that once my contract ended in two years my relationship with Rogers was over.

Contrast that to the experience I had with my insurance company Belair. They went out of their way to be helpful. The customer service rep contacted me several times, offered advice to make the process run more smoothly and I was reimbused for my locker losses within two weeks. Perfection.

So this week, when I got my Belair insurance renewal in the mail and noticed my premium went up $7 a month, I didn't care. They were fair with me back in July -- more than fair -- and because of it I was more than willing to accept the extra fee.

That in a nushell is the bottom line many companies never measure. They're so obsessed with ROI and ARPU that they forget the surest way to retain a client is to treat him like a human being.

Duh?

Comments

[Withheld]

You should consider changing the title of this entry so you can get the attention of Rogers. Something like Who should you chose as you cell phone company...Rogers, Bell or Telus.

[terry levine]

I prefer a more subtle approach. ;-)

[Jill]

I was thinking about the customer service issue this week. I ordered two pairs of glasses and paid half in advance. One pair was ready a day before the other and they wouldn't let me take it out of the store without "paying for it in full" even though my initial deposit was more than double the cost of that pair. Just a stupid way to piss off a customer
Then there's my chipped credit card. I didn't wnat a card with a chip but had no option. Now it won't work, apparently because I put in the wrong PIN too many times. Customer service says it's my fault and I have to go to a bank to reset the card before I can use it anymore. Come on!
These are both minor issues, but neither business is putting the customer first or attempting to make my life easier.
There's too much bureaucracy, too many stiff rules standing between many businesses and their customers. And a person seeking the help of the company they pay good money too, usually just ends up frustrated, angry and looking for some place new to take their business.

[t]

Thanks for the comment Jill. ;-) Don't get me started on pin chip thing. I can now in most places wave my card in front of the PayPass machine without signing or pinning. But if I pin the approval process seems to take forever. How can it be that MasterCard trusts me enough to PayPass one minute but makes me jump through hoops to be approved the next? If you're going to introduce a technology to make things easier, well, shouldn't it?