Customer Service... I do not think that word means what you think it means...

Two stories of customer service - one good, one bad. Which one do you want first? The good one? Too bad, it's my blog. You get the rant first.

Last week, I spent a rather frustrating several minutes on the phone with my cell phone company (at least calls to them don't run up my minutes). I was requesting - for the third time - a copy of my first two bills on the account.

We signed up for the service at the beginning of September, and got a rather annoyed call at the beginning of October from the company asking why we hadn't paid our bill. We responded that we hadn't received one, paid the amount requested, and confirmed our mailing address with them (they'd written it down wrong).

The next month, we again had an annoyed call asking us why we hadn't paid our bill. Now we were annoyed as well and told them that yet again we had not received our bill and could they please send it.

Then at the end of October, I spent several minutes on the phone convincing someone that I had never received my bills for the previous months and they needed to send them. The lackey on the other end acted like he was doing me a favor by not charging me the $8 "bill reprint" fee. He did however do me the favor of at least telling me what my account number was, so I could sign up for online billing. (I would've known my account number and signed up for online billing in September if they had ever seen fit to send me my bill.) Now the power over the bills was at least in my hands though it wasn't retroactive.

Last week when I called, the second lackey I talked to told me the post office must have lost my bills and he would send new ones out but charge me the $8. Now $8 ain't much - good cup of coffee and a biscotti - but I hadn't been the one screwing up here - it was either the cell company or the post office - and I didn't think it was right that I should pay for someone else's mistake. He argued. I lost it and cussed. Then I asked for his supervisor. He finally told me I wouldn't be charged for the additional bill.

Who in the world authorizes staff to argue with a customer over $8? Especially when I've got four phones I'm paying for. What kind of customer service mentality is this? It's not like the $8 was gonna come out of the lackey's pocket! And even though I'm not paying for it, I'm unimpressed with this service provider and am seriously considering switching after only a few months. Was it worth it to them to lose a customer? Especially one with a blog? You notice I haven't mentioned who it is, but if they pull another one like this, you bet their name will be emblazoned across a post!

The good one? My hubby ordered an item off ebay. When it arrived, it was the wrong version. He emailed the seller. She looked at it and said, yep, oops, that was my bad. I posted the wrong version.

THEN. She went out, BOUGHT the version she'd promised, is sending it to him, WITH a SASE to send the wrong one back!

Now THAT's excellent customer service! My cell phone provider could learn a thing or two from her.