Service of Do-it-Yourself Service
February 12th, 2013
Categories: Banking, Do-it-Yourself, Service, Technology
Here’s one more notch in the belt of “if you want service, this is what you must do yourself.”
Credit on Hold
My husband’s credit card account was closed. He found out when he tried to charge some meds and food and the charges didn’t go through in either store. To find out what was going on, he called the credit card provider.
Had he thought to look at his account online before leaving the apartment, he would have seen that there was a notice that the bank had closed it. So we don’t have to learn the news at the cash register, perhaps we should add checking online to the morning routine, after we brush our teeth or before we check that we have our keys.
He learned that a travel agency in the UK tried to charge something to his card which the credit card company determined to be suspicious. American Express telephones–at least it did when I had a similar problem.
Servers that Don’t
Meanwhile I was given the bum’s rush by my email host. I spent three weeks in email hell, unable to send any at times for no reason. People sending emails to me received bouncebacks and we couldn’t figure out why.
After doing everything possible to solve the problems and several calls to the company I spoke with one honest fellow late one night who told me “We’ve been working on the server for the last week,” and “the problem is beyond our systems.” He admitted they didn’t know how to fix it yet, wanted me to know the real story so I didn’t blame my high speed connection, my computer, anything or anyone else–all of which I had. I asked when he thought it would be repaired and he said “24 to 48 hours.”
Two days later I called again and spoke with the first obnoxious person I’d confronted at this company in the many years it had been my vendor. I kept asking him if they’d repaired the server and he’d respond with “I need to see a copy of the original bouncedbacked email.” I would say, “I sent you the bounceback notification. How can I send you the original that I never got? Please answer my question: ‘Are your servers up and running’?”
I gave up and now have a new email host.
In addition to lost time, frustration and goodness knows how many emails I never received because they were bounced back and the senders didn’t let me know [it's not their job], I also spent a tidy sum on the wonderful IT person who was trying to figure out what was what on my end.
So why didn’t this vendor inform its millions of customers? I fished around online for clues and there were none. This is a company that communicates like crazy when it wants to. I get emails almost daily about what other services I should buy from them yet not a peep about email server issues. They have the money: They ran a [extremely distasteful] commercial during the Super Bowl.
I anticipate problems when a company spends more money on marketing than on its product. For years these people were terrific–they had the balance right.
Do you have examples of do-it-yourself service or businesses that spend more on marketing than on their product or service?
Companies simply do not train their customer service people very well anymore. I received a notice from a collection agency who was representing my secondary medical insurer. They were trying to collect a reimbursement for service from a doctor of mine who had opted out of Medicare (an increasing number seem to be doing so). I am entitled to some reimbursement according to my policy with the secondary; however, when I called spoke to their customer service rep to complain about the attempted collection, I was told 1/ to find another doctor and 2/ “If Medicare doesn’t pay, we don’t pay.” I informed her that was not the case and she then said to file an appeal. Which I did after calling the collection agency to tell then I was doing so.
About one month after filing a 6-page appeal, I got a form letter from the secondary insurer telling me that they declined to pay any more on the claim!! I sent a copy to the collection agency and that was it.
Also, I discovered that even when I include an opt-out letter from my physician with any reimbursement claim to the secondary, whoever initially handles the claim chooses not to explore the paperwork and I invariably receive a notice saying the company will not pay until they know what Medicare paid!
ASK,
There are certain businesses that make money by being overly complicated. Who can figure them out? Meanwhile, they do and charge what they like. Most people shrug and accept the verdict because they don’t know where to start or what to do. It is an atrocious but profitable business model. Good for you for breaking through!
Some credit card companies are better than others, and since they aren’t the only game in town, switching seems to be the best policy. Citibank discovered a breach in security some time ago, and immediately closed accounts, while reopening them with a new number. The company alerted the card holders immediately. Suffering public humiliation with a nonworking card is cause enough to close a business relationship.
It’s hard to understand how an email company which adds letters to senders names is still in business. My reaction, especially if there are customers, is unprintable.
Lucrezia,
I agree about the sinking feeling of standing at a cash register to be told, “Sorry….” etc. but today, with so much hacking and identity theft going on, I bet the cashiers are no longer surprised as they once were. This is not an endorsement for being casual and supremely laid back about informing a person that his/her account has been closed. The good news is that my husband was well known by both small neighborhood store owners, he’d done business with them for years and they knew he was good for the money.
I can’t forget the story that a car repair company cashier shared. The shop [not in the greatest neighborhood] was giving my parent’s car a checkup as it was time–in fact, they’d gotten a ticket because they were one day late and the car was being parked on the street in my neighborhood at the time. Dad was in the hospital and Mom was in no condition to deal. The cashier told me that when he’d put through a credit card charge he immediately got a phone call from AmEx telling him to keep the credit card as the person in question was in trouble with AmEx–unpaid bills etc. He told the voice on the phone that he couldn’t possibly do this, that it wasn’t his job to create a fuss and that he didn’t want to expose himself to violence. What a dilemma! He told the cardholder the charge wasn’t approved, but he didn’t take his card.
I was going to answer your suggestion that your readers provide their own examples of shoddy customer service with a quite different reply when something our accountant said a few minutes ago struck me as more apt.
He was reviewing our books in anticipation of filing our 2012 corporate tax returns, and I asked him about how this year’s tax season was going. It was like I had pushed the on button on a talk radio show, he couldn’t stop spouting. In sum, it is shaping up to be the worst ever!
Among other things, for example: Far, far more brokers’ statements than usual are going to be “wrong;” that is, information in them will be inaccurate or just “made up.” Worse, that nice young thing in customer service in Bombay or Bangladesh wouldn’t be able to fix the problem even if he/she wanted to, because the missing numbers have been irretrievably lost in some now defunct company’s old computer, or because the tax code is written in such a way that a beginning number changes every time you make a tax calculation, which, of course, changes the tax calculation, ad infinitem, and of course, the amount of tax you are supposed to pay! And that is just the beginning.
But don’t worry, regardless of what political party you are a member, if you are very rich you, no doubt, gave lots of money to one or more key politician’s campaign, and have a good lobbyist in Washington who got language written into the tax bill last December, for you and your fellow mega-millionaires, to make sure that you pay the least possible taxes.
Oh! And another thing, would you suggest to ASK, in case he or she didn’t see “60 Minutes” last Sunday, that he or she be careful that the medical insurance company’s collection agency doesn’t try to “sand bag” her credit standing with the credit reporting companies. Also, tell him or her, that I admire his or her spunk for being courageous enough to take the “S_B’s” on!
Jean P,
You have described the ultimate in confusion–taxes: Convoluted guidelines and rules on steroids.
I hope what you wrote doesn’t mean that anyone with a bank account, stock or bond will be audited.
With all the auditors needed, should this be true, it won’t help the job situation. People with their skills are just the ones who don’t need jobs. A good one can practically name his/her salary. And who in the end pays for this mish mosh, through no fault of his/her own? John and Jane Q Citizen.
I agree with you re. ASK. We should all be just like her. Allow people to take advantage and they will. Bug them and it might not be as profitable or worth it. Toss out the oil for that squeaky wheel!
Yes, I also saw that extremely worrying 60 mins segment saying that whatever is in your credit report cannot under any circumstances be changed and no one can or has any authority to do anything about any mistake in it/them. I saw it on the same day as I received a letter from a bank telling of a non-existent $1800 debt they were writing off that they alleged I owed them. Besides questions of who they reported this to in the credit agency sense, the instance really concerned a 1099 which is a government form they send to the IRS notifying them that in my 2013 accounts, I have to report this as INCOME! And pay taxes on it!!
In advance of a congressional report of some type, i think we all need to make millions of reports to our congressmen asking for something to be done about this illegal business of the agencies having two reports, the one they let you see and the REAL one containing all the mistakes that they dont let you see!
As to your question, AT&T must be the ultimate example of a company which spends huge amounts of money lying to cover up how bad its service is.
DManzaluni,
My problem wasn’t with AT & T. Interesting perspective–that a company spends money to cover up bad service. In the case of my former email host, people think that when they see a big company that can afford to advertise a lot it must be good and they pile on. I took a flyer on a company not many knew about [recommended to me by knowledgeable insiders] and it was great until it got big.
In days of yore, when AT&T was so big it was about the only show in town phone service was excellent; repairs took no time at all; phones lasted for years….but big today doesn’t always mean best.
Your credit situation is horrendous and inexcusable. There are so many slipshod practices that mesmerize and as a result potentially cripple us.
Yeah, it is incredible how they manage to get away with it, AND how they can emphasize in their own commercials how bad their service is. They go out of their way to allege (probably untruthfully) “FEWER DROPPED CALLS”.
What they mean is fewer dropped calls than they used to drop! After all, assuming you don’t use AT&T, when was the last time you had a dropped call attributable to your phone? (in my case, never. I use T-Mobile) Now when was the last time you spoke to someone and their service suddenly dropped the call? You know when you are calling someone on AT&T because suddenly you hear a sound like bubbles coming up from the bottom of a swimming pool and HEY PRESTO you are taling to someone on AT&T!
DManzaluni,
Verizon Wireless is my carrier and it’s pretty good. Nevertheless, there are spots in Grand Central Station where I always lose a call. For just a few paces outside a room with ticket vending machines, across from a giant newsstand and near the Swatch watch store it always fails. It can happen if I walk by a store. Boom. I always think that it has something to do with electronics in a space that does its thing but doesn’t allow other devices to work because two steps later you can again be good-to-chat.