As long as I'm bitching: a pet peeve of mine:
Automated "press a number" customer service systems that force you to lie because what you want to do is outside the scope of what the company normally expects.
For example, today I called up a company to tell them to take me off their advertising list. I was with them before, and they've been sending "Come back!" advertisements to me. Well, A) they are more expensive than the competition even with their "special deal"; and B) there was a reason I left them, and they haven't fixed that problem yet.
So I dial the number on the ad, and the first choice is between existing customers and former customers; that one was phrased okay, as I am a former customer. But then the choice they presented is between wanting information on one particular of their products, or wanting to "Come Home" to the company. And there I am, stuck. I don't want information on that product, and I don't want to Come Home, I want to tell them to stop bugging me to "Come Home". Pressing 0 did not get me to a representative, it just repeated the menu. Pressing # would have put me back to the previous menu. The #$@ company forced me to lie about what I wanted to do by pressing the button corresponding to wanting to Come Home to them, just so that I could get a human in the right department on the line to explain the situation to. (To their credit, the person I go through to did not pass me on to anyone else: she did put me on hold, but she made the internal calls and got me off the mailing lists and then confirmed to me that I was off of them.)
And yes, I did grab the agent's ear and explain why I left their company in the first place -- if you don't tell them why you aren't buying, then the company isn't going to learn anything and isn't going to improve. In this situation, it had to do with some legalisms in their service contract such that if you actually use their product, you would automatically be in violation of the contract. I argued the matter out with them a few years ago and they basically told me then that if I didn't like their contract exactly as-is, I should feel free to find another company more to my liking. So I did exactly that -- and the other company treats me just fine and gets my money in return. Meanwhile, the original company still tries to treat its customers like they are the only game in town (like they used to be)... and they wonder why their market share is going down.
Automated "press a number" customer service systems that force you to lie because what you want to do is outside the scope of what the company normally expects.
For example, today I called up a company to tell them to take me off their advertising list. I was with them before, and they've been sending "Come back!" advertisements to me. Well, A) they are more expensive than the competition even with their "special deal"; and B) there was a reason I left them, and they haven't fixed that problem yet.
So I dial the number on the ad, and the first choice is between existing customers and former customers; that one was phrased okay, as I am a former customer. But then the choice they presented is between wanting information on one particular of their products, or wanting to "Come Home" to the company. And there I am, stuck. I don't want information on that product, and I don't want to Come Home, I want to tell them to stop bugging me to "Come Home". Pressing 0 did not get me to a representative, it just repeated the menu. Pressing # would have put me back to the previous menu. The #$@ company forced me to lie about what I wanted to do by pressing the button corresponding to wanting to Come Home to them, just so that I could get a human in the right department on the line to explain the situation to. (To their credit, the person I go through to did not pass me on to anyone else: she did put me on hold, but she made the internal calls and got me off the mailing lists and then confirmed to me that I was off of them.)
And yes, I did grab the agent's ear and explain why I left their company in the first place -- if you don't tell them why you aren't buying, then the company isn't going to learn anything and isn't going to improve. In this situation, it had to do with some legalisms in their service contract such that if you actually use their product, you would automatically be in violation of the contract. I argued the matter out with them a few years ago and they basically told me then that if I didn't like their contract exactly as-is, I should feel free to find another company more to my liking. So I did exactly that -- and the other company treats me just fine and gets my money in return. Meanwhile, the original company still tries to treat its customers like they are the only game in town (like they used to be)... and they wonder why their market share is going down.
VIEW 7 of 7 COMMENTS
greymauser:
no, I mean like this.
daniellemary:
There are actually a bunch of Japanese treats around my city as well, but the issue is I can't get anything specific. It's more like "whatever you can find" sort of deal, and usually that doesn't include much in the way of azuki-flavouring.