Wednesday, April 12, 2006
Cranky
I've suspected for some time that I've become a cranky old woman. I think it's a recognised syndrome these days and so it should be. But perhaps someone should ask why are all us old goats cranky. Maybe it's something to do with the modern world, with things being just too darn complicated; with having too many choices and not having the memory any more to sort through them...or maybe it's just that the organisations and dare I say the people we have to deal with are so damn inefficient. Maybe if 'customer service' started being real customer service again rather than an attempt to con the customer so they end up paying more for less, that might be a novel start. Maybe if people started taking responsibility for their jobs -great or small - and started caring about their customers; well that might move things in the right direction too.
Telecommunications companies. Do I need to go any further for all of you to recognise that I probably have a justifiable complaint - not just an old person's whine?
Four times I have rung my Telco of choice (Optus) to try to change the 'plan' on my mobile phone. The first time I was told they couldn't accept a direction to change the plan over at the end of its current period, no, I would have to change it today and suffer the penalties in call cost charges from the end of the previous billing period. But there was a way out of this, I could keep the current plan for the rest of the month, ring 2 or 3 days after the end of this billing period and ask for the change to be backdated to the start of the new billing period. So I did. And being a suspicious and cranky old person, I belaboured the point with the hapless 'customer service representative'. You're sure this has been backdated to the start of this billing period (2 days previous as advised). "Yes, your request has been noted and your next month will be billed at the reduced fee. "I have paid one month in advance," say I, "so you will credit me that amount." "Yes, all you have to do is not pay your last bill at the higher amount and it will all work out even." Next month you will be charged just the lower rate. I wait one month.
My next account shows me owing two months at the higher rate. Rather than being an account showing $50 credit paid against $50 debt and a bill for $9 in advance for the next month ... oh no, I now owe them $100 and my account is overdue! So I ring again. This time I get a callow youth who takes the attitude that I am either deaf or stupid - but at least I have the wits left to get his name this time. After an hour trying to get him to understand what I'm on about, he finally decides he'll credit me with $40 (because he claimed I still owed $9 for the previous month) and I will need to pay $18 for this month and last month. Now I still think this is wrong but just get worn down by his attitude. "If I pay you $18 now do you guarantee me that my account will be cleared?" "Yes," says Mr young and supercilious."If you pay $18 you will not get another account till mid April." Fine I say and give him my credit card details. Once again making him assure me that he has fixed everything up on the screeen, in front of him, and that my account is now in order and no moneys owing till mid April.
Then my work decides to give me a work phone and I want to keep my number. So they "port" it to their Telco. Today I ring Optus again to ensure that my account has been closed off. Mind you my phone stopped working on their network on Monday when the number was "ported", however... just because I'm old and cranky and untrusting of these people's efficiency, I ring to ensure I'm not going to get yet more incorrect bills.
Guess what - my account still shows $48 owing and, by the way they will also charge me $8 for "taking my optus number to Telstra". No, I say, it's not an Optus number, it's a Telstra number that I originally "ported" to Optus. But of course I'm told I've misunderstood what the "customer service person" was saying...she didn't really mean it was an Optus number, what she meant was that I was being penalised $8 for having the hide to transfer the number I had brought to Optus back with me to Telstra. I did manage to get her to credit the $48 after an hour of explanations - remember this is the third time I've tried to sort this out - but no, I still had to pay the extra $8. So I paid it. Only time will tell whether I once again get the bill for the $48 next month.
While all this was going on, at one stage I was asked if I would like to speak to a supervisor to which I answer a resounding yes! After keeping me on hold for a full 10 minutes, my 'customer service representative' came back and told me the supervisor said it was no use talking to her because she would only tell me the same thing. Which thing was that I wonder... that my bill was squared away on 15 February, or perhaps that my bill was squared away by paying $9 more than I believed I owed on 12 March, or maybe that yes, I did have to pay the extra $8 for taking their number to another company, or maybe that even though it wasn't 'their number' I still had to pay!!!!!
1. If the company had decent rules and efficient billing practices, none of this would have been necessary
2. If they trained their customer service representatives to be able to understand and use their online systems, none of this would have been necessary
3. Or maybe if their bloody systems and rules were not totally designed to confuse the customers and allow the company to rip them off for extra fees and charges... I would have been spared the waste of 3 hours of my time and a great deal of angst!
4. Or perhaps, if the 'customer service' people really tried to service the customers rather than just the company and when someone asked them to ensure that the details had gone through on their screens and that the account was squared away that they would actually perform the action necessary, check it and ensure that the advice they had given was correct... ah, perhaps that would be called taking responsibility for one's job or taking pride in one's work - obviously too much to expect these days.
Then I went to the grocery store where there were very few customers but absolutely no trollies - they were all out languishing in the car park. I traverse the endless aisles with a plastic basket that's eventually the approximate weight of a pair of lead boots and overflowing. When I reach the checkout and ask for cigarettes, another "cranky old woman" grunts and sighs and drags the packets in and out. Finally casting her eyes to heaven she says: " We do the same things every day here, over and over, it's not difficult... but every day they just put the packets back all over the place, not where they are supposed to be. It's so wearing always having to re-stack and tidy up after them." Hallelujah! A kindred spirit. Just take some responsibility people!
This reminds me of the garbage tins in the block of units where I live. There are four bins for "waste" and three for "recyclables" - recyclable items are clearly described on the lids of the recycle bins. But every day I go down there and oversize items are shoved into already overfilled bins, causing the lids to be propped open and supporting huge colonies of flies and ants, while the next bin is - you guessed it - completely darn empty, pristine. And since when could anybody in their right mind consider a length of hose or a used and greasy pizza container as "recyclable"! Must just be me eh? A cranky old woman. A cranky old woman who moves their garbage from one bin to another to cut down on the smell and the flies.
Then tonight, the final indignity. Suddenly my computer, which was working perfectly earlier today, won't turn on. When it eventually does, the screen is all wavy lines. Half an hour of fiddling later I manage to get everything back virtually to normal, except when I move down a page on the internet I now get whole pages leafing like a book instead of a steady scroll. I don't know how to fix this. I don't even know if I will get the black screen again next time and have to spend another hour battling with this technology that's become so essential to me. And I'm wondering if my new bloody mobile (which has some sort of infrared technology connected) has maybe done something to my computer while I was trying to learn to use it and entering names today in the same room as the computer. Maybe it's just gremlins taking their revenge on the old and the useless and the cranky.
I may talk to you again; or maybe I'll just go away somewhere and dribble quietly in a corner for the rest of my old, cranky and useless life!
Telecommunications companies. Do I need to go any further for all of you to recognise that I probably have a justifiable complaint - not just an old person's whine?
Four times I have rung my Telco of choice (Optus) to try to change the 'plan' on my mobile phone. The first time I was told they couldn't accept a direction to change the plan over at the end of its current period, no, I would have to change it today and suffer the penalties in call cost charges from the end of the previous billing period. But there was a way out of this, I could keep the current plan for the rest of the month, ring 2 or 3 days after the end of this billing period and ask for the change to be backdated to the start of the new billing period. So I did. And being a suspicious and cranky old person, I belaboured the point with the hapless 'customer service representative'. You're sure this has been backdated to the start of this billing period (2 days previous as advised). "Yes, your request has been noted and your next month will be billed at the reduced fee. "I have paid one month in advance," say I, "so you will credit me that amount." "Yes, all you have to do is not pay your last bill at the higher amount and it will all work out even." Next month you will be charged just the lower rate. I wait one month.
My next account shows me owing two months at the higher rate. Rather than being an account showing $50 credit paid against $50 debt and a bill for $9 in advance for the next month ... oh no, I now owe them $100 and my account is overdue! So I ring again. This time I get a callow youth who takes the attitude that I am either deaf or stupid - but at least I have the wits left to get his name this time. After an hour trying to get him to understand what I'm on about, he finally decides he'll credit me with $40 (because he claimed I still owed $9 for the previous month) and I will need to pay $18 for this month and last month. Now I still think this is wrong but just get worn down by his attitude. "If I pay you $18 now do you guarantee me that my account will be cleared?" "Yes," says Mr young and supercilious."If you pay $18 you will not get another account till mid April." Fine I say and give him my credit card details. Once again making him assure me that he has fixed everything up on the screeen, in front of him, and that my account is now in order and no moneys owing till mid April.
Then my work decides to give me a work phone and I want to keep my number. So they "port" it to their Telco. Today I ring Optus again to ensure that my account has been closed off. Mind you my phone stopped working on their network on Monday when the number was "ported", however... just because I'm old and cranky and untrusting of these people's efficiency, I ring to ensure I'm not going to get yet more incorrect bills.
Guess what - my account still shows $48 owing and, by the way they will also charge me $8 for "taking my optus number to Telstra". No, I say, it's not an Optus number, it's a Telstra number that I originally "ported" to Optus. But of course I'm told I've misunderstood what the "customer service person" was saying...she didn't really mean it was an Optus number, what she meant was that I was being penalised $8 for having the hide to transfer the number I had brought to Optus back with me to Telstra. I did manage to get her to credit the $48 after an hour of explanations - remember this is the third time I've tried to sort this out - but no, I still had to pay the extra $8. So I paid it. Only time will tell whether I once again get the bill for the $48 next month.
While all this was going on, at one stage I was asked if I would like to speak to a supervisor to which I answer a resounding yes! After keeping me on hold for a full 10 minutes, my 'customer service representative' came back and told me the supervisor said it was no use talking to her because she would only tell me the same thing. Which thing was that I wonder... that my bill was squared away on 15 February, or perhaps that my bill was squared away by paying $9 more than I believed I owed on 12 March, or maybe that yes, I did have to pay the extra $8 for taking their number to another company, or maybe that even though it wasn't 'their number' I still had to pay!!!!!
1. If the company had decent rules and efficient billing practices, none of this would have been necessary
2. If they trained their customer service representatives to be able to understand and use their online systems, none of this would have been necessary
3. Or maybe if their bloody systems and rules were not totally designed to confuse the customers and allow the company to rip them off for extra fees and charges... I would have been spared the waste of 3 hours of my time and a great deal of angst!
4. Or perhaps, if the 'customer service' people really tried to service the customers rather than just the company and when someone asked them to ensure that the details had gone through on their screens and that the account was squared away that they would actually perform the action necessary, check it and ensure that the advice they had given was correct... ah, perhaps that would be called taking responsibility for one's job or taking pride in one's work - obviously too much to expect these days.
Then I went to the grocery store where there were very few customers but absolutely no trollies - they were all out languishing in the car park. I traverse the endless aisles with a plastic basket that's eventually the approximate weight of a pair of lead boots and overflowing. When I reach the checkout and ask for cigarettes, another "cranky old woman" grunts and sighs and drags the packets in and out. Finally casting her eyes to heaven she says: " We do the same things every day here, over and over, it's not difficult... but every day they just put the packets back all over the place, not where they are supposed to be. It's so wearing always having to re-stack and tidy up after them." Hallelujah! A kindred spirit. Just take some responsibility people!
This reminds me of the garbage tins in the block of units where I live. There are four bins for "waste" and three for "recyclables" - recyclable items are clearly described on the lids of the recycle bins. But every day I go down there and oversize items are shoved into already overfilled bins, causing the lids to be propped open and supporting huge colonies of flies and ants, while the next bin is - you guessed it - completely darn empty, pristine. And since when could anybody in their right mind consider a length of hose or a used and greasy pizza container as "recyclable"! Must just be me eh? A cranky old woman. A cranky old woman who moves their garbage from one bin to another to cut down on the smell and the flies.
Then tonight, the final indignity. Suddenly my computer, which was working perfectly earlier today, won't turn on. When it eventually does, the screen is all wavy lines. Half an hour of fiddling later I manage to get everything back virtually to normal, except when I move down a page on the internet I now get whole pages leafing like a book instead of a steady scroll. I don't know how to fix this. I don't even know if I will get the black screen again next time and have to spend another hour battling with this technology that's become so essential to me. And I'm wondering if my new bloody mobile (which has some sort of infrared technology connected) has maybe done something to my computer while I was trying to learn to use it and entering names today in the same room as the computer. Maybe it's just gremlins taking their revenge on the old and the useless and the cranky.
I may talk to you again; or maybe I'll just go away somewhere and dribble quietly in a corner for the rest of my old, cranky and useless life!
Comments:
that was a hell of a rant. with telcos and banks, i find it better to just wear the charges and fees than try to do anything about it. it's not the call centre workers' fault, though - humans aren't meant for jobs like that.
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