Good Morning,
The last few weeks have been busy and I have had a hard time formulating messages I felt worthy of your time (I started about 6). For some of you, you have enjoyed a nice respite, others, I am sorry for the delay.
Over the last few months I have been having troubles with my Garminfone, cell phone. I loved it when I first got it and it did well for many months. Then came the Android system upgrade and a series of problem that followed, including dropping calls, rebooting for no reason, locking up the Bluetooth and making calls just because I touched some random part of the phone. I have also had three replacements, two in the last 90 days. I have performed a master reset twice, and had a new battery sent, and changed memory cards. During the last two months, I have not downloaded any applications onto the phone, as one of the first questions I get when calling customer service is what have I downloaded. It is kind of lame to have an Android phone and not use the Android market, especially with the apps I bought and did not install again.
With the phone running on core applications I have not been posting to facebook, twitter, etc., like I used to. The technology had me hamstrung. And I wanted out. I want to post again and share my insights and help others. I felt like a prisoner to my phone.
When I called in to see what my options were after all of these troubles, I was told I would be eligible for a replacement with a phone valued at about 1/3 the restocking fee for my phone (the cost I would be charged if I did not return the Garminfone within 7 days of getting the replacement). Yeah, that seemed fair to me too……not.
So I called customer service one more time to gauge what my options were. The technical support rep told me about having my phone eligible for an upgrade. I figured that would be fine. So I called and got a list of phones I could have upgraded for, and the cost for each. The phone I really wanted was the Galaxy S4. I did not want to spend over $100 for the replacement. The phones I was given were middle of the road and one low end. I told the technical support rep I needed a day to decide. They were pushing for me to decide right then and there, and I needed time to check them out.
I went to a local T-Mobile store and looked at the phones and asked the clerks what they thought. In the end I was not satisfied the choices they gave and decided that I would rather put out a little more money to get the Galaxy. This way I would be trading up instead of down.
Next I called before the technical support rep was to call me back today. I wanted to know if my company discount, for where I work, applied to upgrades. The customer service rep I spoke with saw the notes about the phones I was offered in the upgrade and the prices I was quoted. I found out my company discount, which I am happy to have, applied to my bill and new activations only (and they are good discounts).
The time for the technical support rep to call me back, 7:30 PM came and went. This would be the second time I did not get a promised call back.
At 8:30 PM I called the company back and started the ball rolling to get my replacement and for the Galaxy phone at the price quoted the previous day. The customer service rep quoted me a price over twice as high as the price from the night before. So I asked her to read the notes and see where I had been offered the phone at a lower rate. She said she could not offer the lower rate until she spoke with a supervisor. I was placed on hold several times and finally I was on hold for about 45 minutes without a courtesy update and the call dropped.
I called back again and immediately asked for a supervisor. When I got to the supervisor I told her of my bad experience and what I was looking to do. So I was quoted another price. This one was right in the middle of the low and the high end.
I asked her why they had three different prices for the same phone for the same upgrade plan. She told me that she could only tell me the offer that she saw on her screen.
I asked her if her peers and customer service staff had access to different information than she did because they kept giving me different information. She told me she could only give me the info she saw on her screen.
I then asked for a manager and was promised to speak with a senior supervisor, but that they were on break and they could call me back. I told them I would wait.
30 minutes later, some break….., I am told that they reviewed my account and saw where the supervisor from the day before quoted me the lower price, but she could not find information to corroborate it.
Next I get transferred to specialized customer care group for customers who are about to leave the company and go to another carrier.
I told the person that I was not looking to leave, I just wanted to upgrade my phone to one I knew would work (and one that was still in production and being supported, as the Garminfones are no longer offered).
She gave me another price, happily this one was lower than all of the other prices.
I asked her if she could suggest to her leadership the huge gap in the different prices I was given by the different people, front line representatives and supervisors. She told me that she was only giving me the low price because of my loyalty to the company and the troubles I had had with my Garminfone. That the other people could not see her price.
So I reiterated that I was thankful for the price, but the point was they were going to have a lot of irate callers because of getting so many different price quotes on the same product, under the same circumstances.
Again, she reiterated why was giving me the price, that she understood what I was saying.
I don’t think she saw the big picture. I like getting a good price, and I like getting good service, and sure I like getting a good price after bad service, but the fact that no one seemed to care to fix the bad service was sad.
It was as if no one cared about the company. They did their own job and tried covering their own butts, but when it came for an opportunity to make something better, their eyes figuratively glazed over and they went back to ‘well that is what is on my screen’.
It is sad. And what is worse, it is endemic to many parts of our country.
Businesses and people who just don’t seem to care. They don’t mind mediocrity or worse.
That is not the world I want to be in, or the country I want to live in, or the organization I want to work for.
But what do we do?
How can we make a difference?
The answer is not easy, and the road is even harder.
We have to suck it up and get tough.
We have to follow our hearts and keep true to our values.
We need to go the hard road.
It is lonely and there are a lot of people trying to derail you on the path to better.
If you choose to take the path, and go the route, it could be one of the hardest things we ever do.
Maybe if we help each other, we can make our way to the world of better together.
Are you with me?
Enjoy!
Sanford Berenberg
Sanford@berenberg.net
http://www.berenberg.net
http://sanfordberenberg.blogspot.com/
Follow Me on Twitter! http://twitter.com/sberenberg
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