Category: Customer Experience

Hoops

Hoops

I’ve been to our brand new local health centre for some blood tests today. I’m pleased to confirm that despite rumours to the contrary, it is definitely blood that flows through my veins. It took a while to find out mind you.

Queue Number One: The queue where you wait to be given a queuing number (I kid you not). Then you move to…

Queue Number Two: The queue where you wait to be called through in groups of ten. Then you move to…

Queue Number Three: The queue where you wait to be called for your blood test.

This place opened at the end of May 2012, it’s supposed to be state of the art. There are electronic signs telling you what time the next train leaves the local station, scrolling news updates and even what temperature it is outside (like I haven’t figured that out on the journey there..?). And the NHS has designed in a queuing system the Victorians would be proud of.

Progress matters, it’s a powerful motivator. The illusion of progress? Well that just makes my blood boil.

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Bounced

Our trampoline has seen better days so we thought we would spruce it up a bit and splash out on a new pad to go round the edge, and a new enclosure and pole pads. These last two items are particularly helpful when it comes to retaining enthusiastic jumpers within the trampoline environment, i.e, it stops folk from falling off.

On 20th June 2012 I called up Outdoor Toys Direct, the company we bought the trampoline from in Spring (ho ho!) 2008 and was a little surprised to find the replacement costs of the new parts came to £130, compared to an original purchase price of just under £200 for the whole kit and kaboodle. I didn’t really want another trampoline cluttering up the place so I bit the bullet and ordered the spares. Here’s a summary of what happened next:

Money taken from account, email confirmation arrives

25th June: Pad and enclosure delivered minus pole pads

26th June: Called and asked for pole pads, more emails arrived confirming extra pads ordered

28th June: Pole pads arrived, not enough sent. Delivery driver won gold medal for unhelpfulness

28th June: Called and asked for more pole pads, more emails arrived confirming extra pads ordered

3rd July: Pole pads arrived

Finally, all the raw ingredients are here now we can revamp the tramp! New pad goes round the outside edge of the trampoline, nicely does it. Pole pads go on, nicely does it. We get the enclosure out, it’s the wrong size 🙁

4th July: Called and asked for correct size enclosure. Staggeringly I’ve remained polite throughout despite all the cock ups and a distinct whiff of indifference every time I call. On this last call I explained that I’d really like to get this trampoline in shape before the weekend when 15 kids are gonna rock up and want to play on it.

5th July: Email arrives confirming correct size enclosure ordered, it looks like the final piece of the puzzle may just arrive in time…

6th July: Email arrives confirming my money has been refunded.

I’m guessing that Outdoor Toys Direct have given up. Maybe they can’t source the part we need? Maybe they just can’t be arsed any more? Who knows? I certainly don’t know because they’ve not told me anything. I’d love to see the employee handbook for this place, I bet the Customer Service pages are blank, or perhaps they show a flow chart ending with the company sticking two fingers up to their customers? And if this is how they treat their customers, I hate to think about how they treat their staff.

Dealing with this company is exhausting, I’m way too tired to write a song about it. But if I could rap (which thankfully for you I can’t), I’d probably rap something like this:

I ordered some spares for our trampoline, The fuss came next like a ruptured spleen

I called many times (how many?) Umpteen, Hanging on the phone I need my caffeine

I just wanna cover made of polypropylene, The pads are blue in colour not aquamarine

By the time they arrive my kid’ll be a teen, Wearing make up ‘n’ stuff made of nitrosamine

I just want to revamp my trampoline……word.

I know, it’s just a trampoline, what’s all the fuss about? Part of me agrees, and part of me thinks that companies like this rely on silent disgruntlement to keep them in business. If it takes a bit of jumping up and down occasionally (sorry!), then so be it.

Size Matters!

Ah, one of life’s great questions – does size matter? In winding up my Dad’s affairs I’ve had to deal with a number of financials institutions lately, and the service I’ve experienced from them has differed markedly. The best service has come from Monmouthshire Building Society and Nationwide Building Society. I’ll come back to them and why I think they’ve cracked it later in this post. For now – let’s get the bad guys out of the way:

Credit Suisse – Award for Confusion

Credit Suisse at first refused to return my Dad’s death certificate and then followed up with a series of forms to fill out, each one duller and more complicated than the previous. Trying to find their phone number is like looking for a needle in a haystack, and the disinterested way with which I was dealt with kinda left me thinking I wish I’d found the needle instead and used it to gently stab myself in the eye.

National Savings – Award for Speed

After waiting longer for National Savings to answer the phone than all the other organisations, once I got through to them they rushed and harried me like no other company could. I’ve never felt hassled off the phone so quickly, each question felt like a total inconvenience to them, each request for more information met with a sense of reluctance and unpleasantness. I’ll wager the staff are measured on call times or some other dumb pointless thing that drives them to deliver awful service. I feel for the people in the National Savings call centre, from my experience it felt like a totally crap place to work. I realise that for most things the Government provides, we have no choice but to use them, but come on – you’re operating in a competitive market place here!

Now back to the good guys.

Monmouthshire and Nationwide Building Societies – Joint Award for Being Human

The Nationwide has a bereavement team. You get given their number when you first inform them of the death and thereafter, everything is dealt with sympathetically and straightforwardly. In the case of the Monmouthshire, I was fortunate to deal with Kim. Every phone call, every piece of correspondence was between the two of us. I was listened to, and as a result of listening, Kim was able to deal with my claim proactively and supportively. Thanks Kim.

The Monmouthshire has total assets of £742m, and Nationwide has £196,129m. Both are small compared to Credit Suisse’s asset pile of £1,049,165m, and the UK Government, which owns assets values at £337bn. And both Monmouthshire and Nationwide are mutual societies, run explicitly for the benefit of their members. Credit Suisse are a plc, and the UK Government is, well it is what it is.

So from my experience, the size and ownership structure of companies matters. It seems to make it easier for employees to exceed my reasonable service expectations, willingly too. What do you think?

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