An Epic Failure to Service the Customer and Resulting Revenue Loss

This is notes from a recent dialog I had with an Big company representative who utterly failed to comprehend that she lost her employer money by not escalating this.  To be fair to them, I got on the phone and a person stayed with me until they solved the issue.  Their phone service is awesome.  I guess you could say that every barrel has its' 'bad apples'.  Private info is blacked out.

**************FIRST MESSAGE FROM ME********

Hi:

For some reason, I cannot retrieve my password for duanexxx. I no
longer seem to be able to get access to emails at nickull@XXX.com or
duanexxxx@XXXXXXXXXX.com which are listed as the emails that the password
reset goes to.

Can you please reset the password for duanexxxxxxx and send it to
duane@XXXX.XXX?

I am trying to buy software.

Duane

**************MESSAGE BACK***********
Hello Duane,

It's me again, Grace. I apologize for the delay in response, I just got back from my two days off. Thanks for your understanding.

Sorry to hear about that, Duane. However, I still wanna thank you that you have been an  customer. Should you have other concerns, please let us know. Cheers!

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.

**THIS IS THEIR RESPONSE WITH MY SECOND MESSAGE INLINE***
 Inline:

On 12-01-18 1:38 PM, wrote:

Hi Duane,

Thanks for contacting Support again. This is Grace and I'm
taking over on Gagan's behalf. Glad to assist you today.

I understand that you need assistance in resetting your password for
"duanexxxx". I realize your eagerness to have this taken care of,
and I'd be happy to help.

Duane, I can reset the password for you. Before I can do this, I
require that you provide at least one of the following, for your
security:

- the order number of one of your purchases
DN: #120020XXXXXXX

- the last four digits of the credit card used for your account
DN: MasterCard .... XXXX

- the answer to one of your security questions

And two items from this list:

- your birth date
DN: April XX,XXXX

- the billing address listed on the account
DN: XXXX West Xth Avenue, Vancouver, BC XXXXXXX

- the phone number on the account
DN: One of these
604 XXX XXXX
604 XXX XXXX
604 XXX XXXX

Upon receiving your response, we will verify your billing address,
reset your password, and send you an email with your new password.

Take care and have a good one, Duane!

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.


*****THE MESSAGE I GOT BACK A DAY LATER****

On 12-01-18 2:49 PM, wrote:

Hi Duane,

Thank you for providing the information that was requested, Duane.
However, the credit card number and order number you provided did not
match our records. Now to have this sorted out, please respond to this
email and provide other credit card numbers you used on the account
that you are trying to access. Or, provide an order number that you recall
you made on the account "duanxxxxxx".

Thanks for your patience, Duane. Hope to hear back from you. :)

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.


*************MY RESPONSE*****************

At this point I sent her several emails showing orders made from the specific account in question
and using the credit card.  All these orders were labelled with all the data she had requested.

I also asked her to please expedite this as we are trying to make a decision to go with a competitor.

*******MY (SEMI RUDE) RESPONSE**********
So screw you. We decided to buy (A competitor) instead. As I told you
yesterday, we were trying to buy software from [you]. I am
responsible for IT buying in my company and you made the decision easy.
We will now use [someone else's software] as the standard.

I am really angry at the fact I have provided you everything you asked
for below and you don't even phone me or respond.

You just lost your company $$$

GoodBye!

***AND YET ANOTHER DAY LATER I GET A CHEERFUL BUT USELESS REPLY***

On 12-01-19 10:18 AM,  wrote:

Hello Duane,

I'm sorry to hear about that. It's really a pain for me as an
advisor to loose a valued customer like you. But please, allow me to
explain the other side of this issue.

If you feel that way because I am unable to reset your password right
after 30 minutes, and I am unable to phone you, I admit that it is my
complete mistake as I haven't given you a heads up. Please note that we
are receiving volume of emails and there are tendencies that we
overlooked replies. Further, [our company] does not provide
assistance via phone call so we are doing our best to provide you with assistance
through email.

Duane, please don't get me wrong about this, as much as possible I would
not want to be the reason of loosing a valued customer, so I apologize
about what happened.

Thanks for bearing with me. Have yourself a wonderful day!

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.


**************NOTES*************


OK.  At this point I am now completely pissed off.  WTF is she talking about 30 minutes???  I gladly would have loved if it had been done in twice that time.  The "Have a wonderful day" quote is about as stupid a thing you can say to a pissed off customer.  The last line "Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you." should perhaps only be used when the customer service rep actually does something.  What about not being allowed to use a phone to sort this out????

But wait - there is more...

*********MY RESPONSE*************


So are you giving me access to my account or not? I sent you all orders
I have copies of, answered every question you asked etc. I also waited 24
hours now, not just 30 minutes, which would be okay. I haven't bought [your competitors software] yet so if you can do this in the next hour, maybe we will stay as customers.

Reset the duanxxxx password and or change the email account used to
retrieve the password to duane@xxx.xxx or duane.xxx@xxxx so I
can do it myself.

If not, not only will you lose a customer, I will seek any legal remedies
that are available to me against you for denying me access to my
account and previous purchases.

Since I have given you everything you asked for, you should just do this
right now. I should not suffer anymore because your company does not
allow you to pick up a phone to verify me.

Duane Nickull


************HER RESPONSE*************


Hi Duane,

Thanks for your response again. As you have requested, I reset the
password for "xxxxxx". This is the password: xxxxxxxx.

Please let me know if it still does not work. Thank you!

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.


************NOTES*************


Guess what?  It did not work!!  I sent another barrage of emails explaining politely that it did not work.  This is where I decided to call and got a smart, capable  rep who fixed the issue.


*********HER REPSONSE (24 hours later)**********


Hi Duane,

Thanks for letting me know about that. I checked your account and found
that "xxxxxxxxx" is renamed to "xxxxxxxxx". This is why
you're still unable to access the account.

Now, please sign in with "xxxxxxx" using the password I
provided. If you still can't, I will have to reset the password again for
you.

Thanks for your patience.

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.


*********NOTES*********


So at this point I had the issue solved by the very capable and heroic guy from their help telephone desk.  I tried her advice again and once again, it did not work.  This prompted me to send yet another email back saying "It doesn't work"


**********HER RESPONSE (A DAY LATER)********


On 12-01-20 3:41 PM,  wrote:

Follow-Up: 173662775

Hello again,

I wanted to send a quick note to see if you are still experiencing any
difficulties with the  Store. Resolving your issue is important to
me, so please don't hesitate to reply if you need any further assistance.

Sincerely,

Grace
Please Note: I work Mon-Fri, 8:00AM-5:00PM CT
Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to assist you.


*********MY FINAL RESPONSE************


???

You didn't think it was important enough to fix when I asked yesterday so
we went with [competitor] instead. We will not buy your products for our
office.

Duane

************FINAL NOTES**********

Ok - I got mad.  I acted a bit unprofessional but honestly, this sort of thing should be a lesson for anyone doing customer service.

1.  Don't wait 24 hours each time.  Note the entire thread took place over 6 days.
2.  Escalate things if you can't figure them out.  I don't claim to know everything and will gladly escalate stuff to whomever can help.
3.  Don't be condescending to the customer with crap like "Have a wonderful day" when you know they're frustrated at you.

and lastly...

Grace - you are an idiot!!!!