Customer Experience – Page 3 – The Consulting Artist

Take Me Out To The Ball Game

I’m just back from my first baseball game. I and a few thousand others spent the afternoon at Yankee Stadium, where the home team lost 4-5 to the visiting Oakland Athletics. The game lasted several hours and kept my attention for most of that time. When I used to go and watch football you could pretty much guarantee that when I went for a wizz, the home team would score, and today was no exception. Nick Swisher (what a fabulous name for a baseball player) scored the only home run for The Yankees when I was…otherwise engaged. Despite seeing the home team lose I had a good time, and a few things stood out for me.

The National Anthem

Although it took place, the National Anthem was a pre-recorded version. Some people sung along and It didn’t work for me compared to the live ones I’ve seen previously at Madison Square Garden, and the Ohio SHRM conference to name but two. No goosebumps this time, note to The Yankees, live is better.

The Crowd

The crowd at Yankee stadium is really mixed. Kids, men, women, younger people, older people and a wide cross section racially too. Football crowds in the UK are overwhelmingly white and male, at least they were when I was a reasonably regular attendee a few years ago. A more diverse crowd made for a much friendlier atmosphere then you’d typically experience at a football game in the UK.

The Beer

Beer is served at your seat. So are hot dogs, peanuts, candy floss and popcorn. Was I so inclined I needn’t have left my seat for the whole game, except to miss the home run of course. You’re not allowed within sight of the pitch with a beer in hand in the UK.

The Tickets

Ticket prices start off pretty cheaply. I could have paid less than $30, though I chose to pay $110 as a one off visit, and I could have paid much more. The Yankees are probably the biggest team in Major League Baseball and could charge more, but by offering a low starting price they attract a broader audience to the game. I think Manchester United standard tickets cost around $90.

The Conclusion

A good crowd, a good game, good beer, and even the pizza slice I had was passable. It strikes me that we could learn a lot from over here about how to put on a good regular sporting fixture over there.

Our Olympic Experience

Earlier this week on Drive Thru HR, William Tincup and Bryan Wempen were asking me about The Olympics. William was saying how great London looked and what my experience of it was. If you have the time and inclination you can listen to the whole interview here (we also talked about social media, differences between the US and UK, service culture and some other stuff too).

Listen to internet radio with Wempen and Tincup on Blog Talk Radio

For the past week and a half the Shaw family has gone London 2012 mad. We’ve had a great time and seen loads of sports. You can read about the men’s and women’s road races (which were a highlight for Keira because she was spotted by her friends on the TV), and see a couple of pics here, and in addition I got along to the cycling time trials later in the week and took these photos.

Bradley Wiggins London 2012 Gold Medal Time Trial Ride

Chris Froome London 2012 Bronze Medal Time Trial Ride

Because these sports were run on open roads the access was fantastic, we got right up close to all the action. Later in the week we also got to see the men’s table tennis semi finals and Team GB women’s hockey team defeat Belgium 3-0 at The Riverbank Arena.

And if all that wasn’t enough Flora Marriott was kind enough to invite me to the Greco Roman Wrestling this week. This was a crazy afternoon spent watching up to three simultaneous bouts of muscly guys trying to flip and fling each other, very intense. Emotions ran high, at one point a defeated wrestler staged a sit in protest after what he perceived as a harsh refereeing decision which cost him the bout.

As you can see we’ve been fortunate to enjoy a great variety of sports and we’ve yet to experience the swimming and athletics at The Paralympics.

It has not been easy to get tickets to enjoy all this – for me the one fly in the ointment has been the hours spent fiddling and faffing with the ticketing website, and the way tickets have been released in stages has been frustrating for many people.

Notwithstanding all the fantastic sport we’ve seen, the overwhelmingly positive thing which stood out for us on our Olympic adventures has been the unpaid volunteers. Almost without exception they’ve struck us as happy, willing and helpful, they’re a big part of what has made London 2012 such a success. I’ve heard rumblings that the volunteers should be awarded the Sports Personality of the Year team award, based on our experiences that would get my vote.

photo credits by yours truly

What a Gas

I’ve recently taken over responsibility for the supply of gas to Dad’s property. The supplier, British Gas had confirmed they would send me a final bill for Dad’s account. In my initial dealings with British Gas I’d been liaising with a bereavement team who were spot on throughout. Based on my previous experiences with service providers, my heart sank a little when the bereavement team told me they were passing my dealings onto the usual billing team. So how’s it going?

Over the weekend I received a threatening letter demanding £380.73. The threats included additional charges to the bill if I don’t pay, passing the account to a debt collection agency, taking me to court and trashing my credit history. As you can imagine, this letter didn’t put me in the best of moods.

I called British Gas today to give them a meter reading for the property. Yeah I know, they didn’t have a meter reading yet somehow they managed to bypass the final bill and go straight to threats, you figure it out.

I dialled the number, and the machine asked for my 12 digit customer reference. I entered it then pushed several more choices before dropping into a queue. The guy who answered, we’ll call him Gassy, committed a classic call centre faux pas as he asked ‘Can I have your customer reference please?’ ‘You’ve already got it, I entered it when I dialled in’ I replied. I politely and firmly refused to give Gassy the number and he agreed that yep – he had it in front of him alright. Whuh?

Gassy then asked me to confirm the supply address (my Dad’s place) which I did and then we were off. I explained I was in receipt of this letter and I didn’t understand why. Gassy and I muddled about a bit, he got confused about addresses, ‘your address on the bill doesn’t match the one you gave me’ so I explained he’d asked me for the supply address not my home address. I could go on, and on, but you get the dull, tedious, boring, mechanical gist of things. Eventually I gave Gassy the meter reading, he reckoned that information would produce a much lower final bill and I should hear further in about two weeks. So much for the threatening letter eh?

After each one of these crappy service experiences in relation to sorting out Dad’s affairs, I keep hoping it’s the last and I keep being proved wrong. To be honest I feel a little awkward keeping writing about them but the truth is, the vast majority of these businesses I’m interacting with seem to be incapable of delivering a timely, accurate, and dare I say it sensitive service. They clearly don’t talk with and listen to customers when designing these experiences and the end results speak for themselves.

I wish I’d had the foresight to ask Gassy how he felt about the whole thing, after all it must be pretty crap being trained to deliver something so unhelpful and unsatisfying, no? I expect he may have exploded.