Rather depressing, actually

[Sylvia727]

Tonight, I ordered pizza to be delivered to my dorm room. ("I got 30 minutes.") Most delivery drivers have trouble finding my dorm hall, since there's no direct access to a road. Usually, I have to walk 100 yards to the road to get to them. So I was pleasantly surprised to find the delivery driver on the front porch. I tipped 20%, which I had already set aside, and made small chat with him for a moment. When I got back up to my room and started eating, however, I kept thinking about how awesome it was that he actually came up to the door. This was excellent service, above and beyond in my opinion, and if I could go back I would tip him much more.

So instead, I decided to call his manager and compliment him. The employee put me on hold for a few minutes, and then the manager asked me how he could help with my order. This location has caller ID cross-referenced to their orders program, so he knew I had a current order. It threw me off for a minute, and I stammered out something about how polite and friendly the driver was. The manager sounded very relieved and asked me for the driver's name. Then he spent two minutes telling me how all his calls are for complaints, and how thankful he was that I called to give positive feedback. Which is rather depressing. Does no one ever take the effort to say "thank you" anymore? I was always taught that compliments are just as important as complaints. I don't call to give feedback on a mediocre order, but if an employee particularly exceeds or fails expectations, I let his/her manager know. How sad is it that a compliment is out of the ordinary for a store which in my experience has above average service?

[Kyree]

Most people now days are too lazy to call up when something good happens. They'll turn to their family or whoever's in their house and talk about how neat/awesome the employee was, but they won't take the time to call the work to tell the manager that.

[Sliceanddice]

Tonight, I ordered pizza to be delivered to my dorm room. ("I got 30 minutes.")

as my trainer said, its a gift of time, not a guarantee lol

[Boochan]

Most people now days are too lazy to call up when something good happens. They'll turn to their family or whoever's in their house and talk about how neat/awesome the employee was, but they won't take the time to call the work to tell the manager that.

Exactly.
I would love for the retail group that my chain/store is part of to give us some customer feedback forms. That people can take and mail in themselves. I presume they don't do this as too many fake ones would probably get handed in, but whatever.
We've only had a couple people make a big effort to compliment our store to management (Not the SM, but the Area/State Managers), which got published in the stores newsletter anyway.

[Emrld]

I too on occassion have notified managment when I feel service has been above and beyond.
I think my favorite is when I am at a sit down style establishment and inform my wait person that something has exceeded expectations and I would like to tell a manager. Of course most wait staff like to have a little fun and about half the time I get a nervous manager. Apparently they will make up stories to send the manager over so the manager is geared up for negative information and then I am gushing goodness.
Now I fully admit I give compliments becuase they are deserved. However, I do find it suprising that behavior is very rarely rewarded.
Don't take this the wrong way . . . but in my mind you should reward good behavior. So the employee who did good should get some additional verbal pats on the back in front of customers. Also, wouldn't you think that the customer who took the time to say nice things should be the one you offer the free soda. or a desert to go, or next visit free app card? Over the person that isn't satisfied about anything?
I know corporate requires butt kissing to make people happy so why if someone is happy would you do anything nice for them.
I am not saying I want to be a gimme gimme gimme either. But it worked in Kindergarten to teach us that students who behavied and were well mannered got gold stars. So those that didn't always keep mind their p's and q's started to behave better cause they wanted a gold star too.

[Catwoman2965]

Good service, etc. should be rewarded....sadly, most customers fail to do so, and will only complain. I've actually sent emails to corporate about service i've gotten in stores.

At Thanksgiving, the outlets near my mom open at midnight, for midnight madness...with extra savings...my cousin made me go...hehehe - and we are waiting outside a particular store, think high end leather purses, etc.

Since that store's products, even in the outlets are pretty pricy, any extra savings are welcome, and as such, the line waiting for them to open was long. But...the staff kept coming out to let us know that so many people at a time would be let in, etc. and kept us informed that they would be opening the doors shortly and so on.

And once we got in, despite the masses of people, the staff kept their cool, etc. so i sent corporate an email, complimenting them.

[zzapp the witch]

Did that yesterday in fact. My son is either exhibiting a skin allergy to amoxicillin, or is trying to get the chicken pox (ihopeihopeihope), so I was trying to get my hands on some Hexol. First two stores I went to had none, so I called my mom to ask her where she got it. She called me back to let me know that Bi-Mart had some, how many bottles, and the girl she talked to. When I got there, the bottles were right where my mom was told they were, and I just *had* to thank the girl that helped us out. (Manager looked worried when I asked for her and he had to hunt her down in the back, kept asking me if he could help with with the problem )

[Gerrinson]

I've had a number of problems with my cable company, between CSRs lying about appointment times and insisting a tech be sent out to confirm the problem exists (why else would I call about my cable being out?)

But, there is the one tech, who has been out twice, and was very knowledgeable, competent, polite, and helpful. Shocking for me, given my track record with the rest of their employees. Such as the tech who drilled into the 220V electric line for the stove. Sadly, Darwin was robbed of victory as he lived with only a jolt. But, I digress.

Anyway, that tech has been out to my place twice and I've called in twice to leave compliments about him. I want him to keep his job and keep coming back. Last time I even treated him to a grinder from the convenience store across the street. I have his name written down so I can request him in the future, too.

But, yes, the supervisors were surprised (pleasantly) that I would call to compliment someone who is good at their job.

[Reyneth]

I do try to but I know I forget or just don't think about it enough. I'll never forget one night when my family was out to dinner - about 15 years ago or more! - and the table next to us were giving the server a hard time. She was awesome for us so my dad made a point to find the manager and compliment her (indirectly calling the other table a bunch of jerks while he was at it). He was classy and thoughtful of others like that.

I once had a lady write a compliment letter to corporate about me. It was such a big deal that the DM announced it/talked about it at our district pre-holiday sales meeting. Apparently corporate would get phone calls here and there but *rarely* a letter.

Ya know, I'm going to order a pizza soon. There's nearly always issues with delivery to me too. If there aren't any, I'll make sure and call the store back and let them know how much I appreciate it.

[draftermatt]

See, I know I'm gonna catch hell for this, but. Good service is your job if you are in the service industry. To me, it's saying something either about the lack of good service, or the abandunce of idiots complaining that it should we should be expected to congratulate people on doing their jobs.

To me a compliment is a day when I don't get a call from the field, or a contractor, architect, engineer, my boss, etc. complaining about something I did.

[Emrld]

draftermatt - Please note: I did say something about above and beyond / exceeding expectations -
Meaning I don't give compliments when service is just good. I do show my appreciation in tip for that.

[Whyme]

I did that with a cable guy once. I had just rented a house and the landlady assured me it was cable ready. Turns out it was satellite ready. The cable guy was very nice, worked extremely hard, turned down my offers of a drink, sweated like a hardworking person will sweat, was there over 2 hours and was extremely pleasant the whole time. He refused a tip so I asked if there was anything I could do for him. At first he said no, then right before he left he said if I really did want to do something I could call his boss. I said sure, give me the number!

He wasn't even out of my driveway yet when I had the boss on the phone. At first the boss was "yeah...yeah..." when I was explaining who I was and the guy I was calling about. When I started raving about what a great guy he was, the boss perked up and thanked me for calling. He said it was nice to hear compliments for a change.

I have to admit, it made me feel gooey inside. I had made 2 people's day

[smileyeagle1021]

draftermatt - Please note: I did say something about above and beyond / exceeding expectations -
Meaning I don't give compliments when service is just good. I do show my appreciation in tip for that.

I agree with Emrld... I won't go out of my way to compliment someone for meeting expectations, but I do think going above and beyond what is expected should be rewarded.

[Reyneth]

I agree with Emrld... I won't go out of my way to compliment someone for meeting expectations, but I do think going above and beyond what is expected should be rewarded.

Exactly.
And in my case, delivering a pizza may not be seen as being "over and above" but given the number of times it's taken twice as long to get to me or the person had to call 2-3 times to find out where I was (even with clear directions) and then the time when my delivery guy gave up after 30 min and brought it back to the store for another person to deliver? Yeah, getting it within 15 min of when they say they will is nice. Getting it when I should get it is a freaking miracle. So those drivers deserve kudos in my world.

PS - my place isn't hard at all to find if you pay attention to STREET names. There's another building on the corner of my street also numbered XYZ - but it's on the other street. And numbered XYZ-A, XYZ-B, XYZ-C. Mine's just XYZ. They always try to go to the other one. Always. My building is a block down the road, but rarely do the lost drivers make it there - they just get stuck at the first one and give up. Or something.

[ArcticChicken]

Speaking from the other side of this equation, it's amazing what a sincere "Have a nice day" or "You have a very nice attitude" can do for my day. I can be having an incredibly shitty day, but one genuine compliment will turn the whole day around. The sad part is, I almost never get them from people who I've done a little bit extra for (point out that their stuff is damaged, inform them of a sale, etc.), but just from people I'm being my usual, chearful, self with. Needless to say, I'm much more inclined to go the extra mile for the folks who are nice to me.