What customer service is...and isn't
October 25th 2011 05:35
About a month and a half ago I closed my Orcon account and joined up with Vodafone, who were offering a better deal on broadband allowances. As a result, Orcon owed me a credit of $81. I contacted them and they told me it would be processed in a few days and the credit refunded within a fortnight.
Nope. It wasn't.
Today is a month later and still there's been no sign of the money. I rang them. As an experiment (because I'd tried ringing the other day and couldn't get through) I sent a tweet to my followers saying: It's 9.20 am. I've just rung Orcon. It'll be interesting to see how long I have to hold. How to learn patience...
Ten minutes later, I tweeted again: 10 minutes holding on for #Orcon - and endless repetitions of "sorry for the wait/thanks for holding etc& of jazzed up 1812 Overture
Ten minutes later: please retweet: 20 minutes and still holding on for someone to answer my call at #Orcon. They must have all gone for morning tea
I was finally answered at 9.50, ten minutes before I was due to go out. In the meantime I'd brushed my teeth, put on my shoes, hat and sunglasses, and gone to the loo. This time I tweeted: Finally answered by #Orcon.Credit didn't get done because something not finalised.Now it might be this week, might be next.Customer service?
I had a discussion with a young man who said that Vodafone hadn't done something with toll calls which meant everything had been delayed, because Orcon had had to do 'it' (not sure what 'it' was) manually. It was now ready and would be paid out either this Thursday or the next; they only pay out on Thursdays. I could tell by his tone that this Thursday wasn't going to be an option and made a bit of a fuss about this - the answer was that they have hundreds of payments to process (what, all customers leaving Orcon?) and he couldn't guarantee it would be this week. I fussed some more, reminding him that not only had I had to wait for an answer to my call for half an hour, but I'd also been waiting a month for the payment in the first place.
Finally he agreed that 'someone' would monitor the credit and let me know what was happening. That someone was going to be him, by the sound of something else he said.
When I came back from town in the early afternoon, there was a tweet addressed to me from Orcon: @mcrowl Sorry for the wait - glad to hear it's getting sorted! ^CP Perhaps making a fuss on Twitter is more effective than trying to get through on the phone (or on their query site, which crashed every time I tried to use it the other night). I replied to their tweet: @Orcon Good to see you notice tweets about you! and in another tweet wrote: @Orcon responded to my several tweets this morning with an apology; hopefully they'll also decrease the time it takes to answer the phone.
According to Orcon's profile on Twitter, they're an Awesome internet company and provider of broadband, phone, mobile and more. Twitter manned by Quentin Reade ^QR, Cam Parker ^CP, Ben McMahon ^BM, and other folk. You'll notice it was Cam Parker who responded to my tweet. I'm not sure if they're employed by the company or are just fans.
That was the not-so-hot customer service from Orcon. By contrast check this out.
My wife bought a pair of secateurs called PowerKut MIII a few years back. (And the loppers that are also put out by the same company.) They've been great and have had endless use round our garden. Today we realised that the spring in the secateurs had broken, which is why they'd stopped working effectively.
I wrote to the company who sells these, showshop.co.nz this afternoon, asking if it was possible to get a replacement spring. Within an hour I received a reply via email saying that the spring was already in the post, and the instructions were in an attachment! Guess which company I'll be honouring on Twitter tonight....
Nope. It wasn't.
Today is a month later and still there's been no sign of the money. I rang them. As an experiment (because I'd tried ringing the other day and couldn't get through) I sent a tweet to my followers saying: It's 9.20 am. I've just rung Orcon. It'll be interesting to see how long I have to hold. How to learn patience...
Ten minutes later, I tweeted again: 10 minutes holding on for #Orcon - and endless repetitions of "sorry for the wait/thanks for holding etc& of jazzed up 1812 Overture
Ten minutes later: please retweet: 20 minutes and still holding on for someone to answer my call at #Orcon. They must have all gone for morning tea
I was finally answered at 9.50, ten minutes before I was due to go out. In the meantime I'd brushed my teeth, put on my shoes, hat and sunglasses, and gone to the loo. This time I tweeted: Finally answered by #Orcon.Credit didn't get done because something not finalised.Now it might be this week, might be next.Customer service?
I had a discussion with a young man who said that Vodafone hadn't done something with toll calls which meant everything had been delayed, because Orcon had had to do 'it' (not sure what 'it' was) manually. It was now ready and would be paid out either this Thursday or the next; they only pay out on Thursdays. I could tell by his tone that this Thursday wasn't going to be an option and made a bit of a fuss about this - the answer was that they have hundreds of payments to process (what, all customers leaving Orcon?) and he couldn't guarantee it would be this week. I fussed some more, reminding him that not only had I had to wait for an answer to my call for half an hour, but I'd also been waiting a month for the payment in the first place.
Finally he agreed that 'someone' would monitor the credit and let me know what was happening. That someone was going to be him, by the sound of something else he said.
When I came back from town in the early afternoon, there was a tweet addressed to me from Orcon: @mcrowl Sorry for the wait - glad to hear it's getting sorted! ^CP Perhaps making a fuss on Twitter is more effective than trying to get through on the phone (or on their query site, which crashed every time I tried to use it the other night). I replied to their tweet: @Orcon Good to see you notice tweets about you! and in another tweet wrote: @Orcon responded to my several tweets this morning with an apology; hopefully they'll also decrease the time it takes to answer the phone.
According to Orcon's profile on Twitter, they're an Awesome internet company and provider of broadband, phone, mobile and more. Twitter manned by Quentin Reade ^QR, Cam Parker ^CP, Ben McMahon ^BM, and other folk. You'll notice it was Cam Parker who responded to my tweet. I'm not sure if they're employed by the company or are just fans.
That was the not-so-hot customer service from Orcon. By contrast check this out.
My wife bought a pair of secateurs called PowerKut MIII a few years back. (And the loppers that are also put out by the same company.) They've been great and have had endless use round our garden. Today we realised that the spring in the secateurs had broken, which is why they'd stopped working effectively.
I wrote to the company who sells these, showshop.co.nz this afternoon, asking if it was possible to get a replacement spring. Within an hour I received a reply via email saying that the spring was already in the post, and the instructions were in an attachment! Guess which company I'll be honouring on Twitter tonight....
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