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As I've said in other posts, I've worked in customer service for 18 years, 15 of those in the telecommunications industry. This is the industry where I think most of our customers do the stealing and ripping off of not only the companies involved, but the honest customers.
In July 2001, I remember the lady from hell who was changing her phone company back from a local competitor to Bellsouth. In the entire conversation, she was upset with my constant disclosures about the costs of everything, and extremely enraged about having to pay a connection charge. The records showed three other people told her about this charge, making me number four! This call took thirty minutes to do, which is three times the normal amount of time for this. She kept saying "Nobody told me I had to pay a connection charge" plus she proceeded to tell me she was told it was free to install new jacks.
Because of this, I kept an eye on her account. Lo and behold, she received the first bill, and it took five other employees before she got the one who would credit that charge for her, again stating "Nobody told me I had to pay for that!"
It gets worse though. A few days later, she called in griping that she had scheduled to have a technician install four additional jacks for her and wanted to know why he had not arrived. Four reps looked at her account and no order was in for this. After speaking to another three reps, it was agreed upon that she could have this all for free! This was $250 worth of work. It really gets bad. A few days after she had these free jacks installed, she changed her phone company back to her old competitor. Why? It turned out her old company does not give free work to anybody, and that everybody has to pay for a service if they want it bad enough. However, Bellsouth, wanting to retain customers, gives in to this almost every day.
You want to know why your local phone rates are going up? It's due to bitchy people like this. One does it, then tells her friends and neighbors how to do it, and soon enough, they all catch on, causing a snowball effect.
It needs to stop. We pay for our services. So should they!
In July 2001, I remember the lady from hell who was changing her phone company back from a local competitor to Bellsouth. In the entire conversation, she was upset with my constant disclosures about the costs of everything, and extremely enraged about having to pay a connection charge. The records showed three other people told her about this charge, making me number four! This call took thirty minutes to do, which is three times the normal amount of time for this. She kept saying "Nobody told me I had to pay a connection charge" plus she proceeded to tell me she was told it was free to install new jacks.
Because of this, I kept an eye on her account. Lo and behold, she received the first bill, and it took five other employees before she got the one who would credit that charge for her, again stating "Nobody told me I had to pay for that!"
It gets worse though. A few days later, she called in griping that she had scheduled to have a technician install four additional jacks for her and wanted to know why he had not arrived. Four reps looked at her account and no order was in for this. After speaking to another three reps, it was agreed upon that she could have this all for free! This was $250 worth of work. It really gets bad. A few days after she had these free jacks installed, she changed her phone company back to her old competitor. Why? It turned out her old company does not give free work to anybody, and that everybody has to pay for a service if they want it bad enough. However, Bellsouth, wanting to retain customers, gives in to this almost every day.
You want to know why your local phone rates are going up? It's due to bitchy people like this. One does it, then tells her friends and neighbors how to do it, and soon enough, they all catch on, causing a snowball effect.
It needs to stop. We pay for our services. So should they!
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