The Stupid Things That Companies Do
Immersed in customer stories, I often scratch my head when I hear about the stupid things that companies do. You would think by now with all of the discussion about the importance of delivering a quality customer experience that companies could get the basics right, but they don't. Instead, I am constantly surprised how companies sabotage their own success. Here's one example I that I recently encountered:
The other day my husband received a notice in the mail from Ford saying that we missed our last car payment and, as a result, would incur a fee. Impossible. The payments are automatically debited from my husband's business account every month.
When my husband called customer service to find out what was going on, the agent told him that Ford canceled its automatic debit service because it was too costly. Because we were not sent a notice prior to Ford canceling the service, we were unaware that our payment hadn't been debited.
My husband asked why Ford would cancel a service that ensures that the company will be paid every month. The agent had no answer. It seems to us that Ford will incur more costs in calls through the contact center from customers inquiring about their non-payments, as well as long-term costs stemming from calls to customers tracking down payments. Not to mention that removing a convenience for customers may hinder the customer experience.
This is just one example. Keep the "stupid" list going. Share your stories.
Related Entries
- Guest Blogger Joseph Jaffe: It's Better to Be S.A.F.E. Than Sorry
- Guest Blogger Ralph Heath: What Has Happened to Customer Service in America?
- Preventing a Customer Experience from Going Downhill
I saw a piece recently asking what would be next now that we have addressed the customer experience. The examples from both you and Dave, and hundreds more we read all the time, suggest that most businesses have yet to even comprehend the breath and depth of the Customer Experience that they deliver.
Yes, corporations accept that customer retention, growth and positive word of mouth all are heavily impacted by the Customer Experience. The point that seems to be missed is that the TOTAL Customer Experience is not just product performance, or customer service, or web functionality, but rather it is compossed of each and every single interaction (every sight, sound, touch, smell, word, image, etc.)that a customer has with the brand. Certainly some interactions are more important than others, but the way HR treats an applicant or the process that the credit department imposes are also part of that Customer Experience and they can greatly impact customer attitudes and future behaviors.
Thanks David. The Snapfish example also sounds like marketing had a hand in that act.
Good luck with your job search.
I recently retired from the Army after running the Army Strong Marketing campaign and am in the process of looking for a marketing job. I am amazed at how companies treat job applicants and forget that we also re potential customers. I am developing a list of products I won't buy because HR has no idea they impact the company brand.
On a positive note...Snapfish sent me a handwritten rejection card with discount coupons. That simple act has had me tell many how impressed I was with their HR service that I can only imagine customer service is just as good or better!
*sigh*
Makes you wonder who's guiding the ship, eh?
Last summer there was great faux pax in how to use monitoring data that can come to you from various tools.
I did a blog post at StevenGroves.com, ut the story goes that a local apartment / property management firm in Chicago had the sense to monitor Twitter for mentions of their company name, but they obviously had no idea what to do with it.
When a tenant replied on Twitter to a friend who had asked ,on Twitter, to come by, saying that if the management company did not care that there was mold in the apartment, they should not either.
A point of context - the tenant had 20 followers, so maybe 5-10 people saw the message. the management firm, in their discovery of a potentially disparaging public remark, promptly filed a $50K lawsuit against the tenant.
The suit was noticed by the local Sun Times, who called the firm to get a comment. In a zealous moment during the interview with the Sun Times, the company stated that they were "a sue first, ask questions later" kind of company. Now a few million people in Chicago heard about it.
This story got picked up by the social media community and run, rerun and run again until millions of people around the world had seen it.
I have not check lately, but I wonder what's happened to their occupancy rate since then? Think they lost more than the $50K they sued for?