We don't control the mail...

[Phone Jockey]

...but she thinks we do!

Customer: I don’t know why you’re billing me so much.
Me: We didn’t receive a June payment.
Customer: I mailed a money order to you in June.
Me: We never received it, mam.
Customer: I don’t care! I know I mailed it!

[NightAngel]

I have sort of the opposite complaint for my customers with our Online program. We can't control how fast or slow the the mail will reach you.

Customer: "I see in my movie queue that the movies ship on a certain day but then they don't reach me until 4 days later!"
Me: "Was the movie turn around in queue quick?"
C: "Yes... but once they ship it takes FOUR days!"
Me: "Do you think you should be talking to the post office about this?"
C: "No! It's your service!"
Me: *sigh* "Funny, in my postal area I get mine in 2 days."
C: "You aren't going to help me?"
Me: "I can't. Only the post office can help you..."

See the loop? They can loop that convo over and over.

[Becks]

...but she thinks we do!

Customer: I don’t know why you’re billing me so much.
Me: We didn’t receive a June payment.
Customer: I mailed a money order to you in June.
Me: We never received it, mam.
Customer: I don’t care! I know I mailed it!

Sounds like the customer should find her money order receipt/tab and take it to wherever she bought it to see if it can be traced then.

Of course, that would make SENSE.

Or else, she's scamming you.

Whichever.

[chainedbarista]

that also depends on when she mailed it; if it was mailed the day of or the day before, it won't register just yet.

things do get lost, of course, but i'm thinking it was more of a case of late to the post office, rather than 'it didn't get there' myself.

moral of the story: MAIL IT SEVERAL DAYS BEFORE THE DUE DATE!!

[Phone Jockey]

Yes, I recommended she contact the post office (where she bought the money order) & have them trace it. I guess she did that, don't know.

[pbmods]

Who is the problem here?

"We never received your payment."
"Really?"
"Actually, we got it last week. But we want to open ourselves up to fraud and theft investigations and possibly get hit with million-dollar fines and some key management jail time so that we can screw some of our customers out of $50."

[Phone Jockey]

pbmods...HAHAHAHAH!! HILARIOUS!

[Crosshair]

Too bad you can't tell the customers that pbmods.

[AmericanZero8503]

The store i work at accepts payments for our local electrical company. I don't know if this is commonplace, or if God hates me and enjoys making me listen to people bitch and moan to me about their bills.

I have no affliation with the power company, all i do is take your money and process the payment over the internet. Something they could do for free at home, but choose to let our store make $2 a bill to do.

We get calls about people claiming that their bill never got sent and they were wondering when they were sent out, or if their payment wasn't sent. Mostly scams, but annoying because we're a grocery store not the freaking power company..leave me alone.

Not to mention that this company makes everyone's bills due on the same weekend, so we get the last minute flood of people that wait till the last minute to pay any bill. The apathy in southern Indiana runs rampant.

[Customer Beating Robot]

Since the topic is about controlling the mail, I feel that this fits the topic.

Years ago I worked at an ISP and we handled our own billing. When I first started working there, I would get asked the question of when bills or refunds would arrive in the mail. The stock answer was 3 to 5 business days. Of course this was always too long. Appearantly everyone owed the IRS or had a bad crack habit.

This of course was taken by the customer as a "gaurantee" that it would be there in that time frame. After the first few chewing outs I would only ever offer the customer an estimate and would stress that it is an estimate. Of course they had to know exactly which date the refund/bill would arrive. The stock question was "So it will definitely be here by Friday?"I had many arguments over people saying "Why can't you just tell me exactly when it will arrive." Then if I tell them a date and it doesn't arrive, guess who is personally responsible and has to get on the phone with the Post Master General to track down where the letter is.

On the flip side, I got alot of "I mailed it last week" excuses. What am I suppossed to do? "Well boss, she says she mailed it, so I guess we have to take her word for it."

[Dark Psion]

I used to know someone who would write out all her checks the day the bill came in, but would then write the due date where the stamp goes and would not mail it till that week.

She said if she mailed her checks too early they would start expecting them early.