Michael and I drove to Chico yesterday and it was warm and sunny. Melissa met us Downtown which is a block or so from Chico College and a mile from her home. We had Greek food which some I liked, some not. Then Michael arranged for Melissa to pick up something for him and mail it, we bought some staples at Costco and Wal Mart and headed home. Nice day, easy trip. Melissa has a nice arrangement with everthing being within walking distance or she can ride her bike. She is so pretty and efficient, I am sure they love her at her new job.
I just spent about an hour on the phone with Amerigas--their mistake, their apology, their refund and change of autopay and personal service to make their new accounting system work for me.
Yesterday I spent about an hour with Dish Network--their mistake, their apology, and they sent me two free pay per view account numbers. I did have to deal with three people before they resolved the issue, however.
If I was working, I would not be able to do this, you don't have the time to track down their errors, and take the time to make them serve you, in stead of you serving their mistakes and just accepting them.
I remember when I used to deal with the phone companies when I was working for James at his office and I would get so emotionally distraught as I tried to manuever and resolve their errors and over charges, etc. etc. No more, I am very calm, but very determined and they correct their errors.
Why are there these errors? I don't know, I don't know where the people who are working for them are, or why it happens, but you do need to be on top of them... probably has something to do with different parts of their operations being done by different people all over the world.
When I was working Disaster Loans in a large office in Fort Worth several years ago, there was a very large office next to us which I visited one day because I was so curious as to what was going on in there. It was filled with free lance people in little cubicles doing billing, or reservations or some other small operation for some big corporation. Very revealing about how business is done these days.
Companies are way too big and so computerized, they really have to work to have good personal service (without errors, I might note)... Just one of the many problems in 2012.