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I'm simply asking you how much customer service matters to you?
To me it matters a lot. If i am treated well at a restaurant and the food is decent, i will definately go back there, even go slightly out of my way to eat there. Same with stores/services where i spend a decent sum of money(ie not McDonalds). I have also worked during the summers while i was in college at various sports and grocery stores and my impression is that people appreciate it, a lot infact, when you try your best to help them and sometimes even go out of your way to help them. In that sense i have the feeling that customer service and relations matters a lot to people when they choose where to buy their stuff. It's even gone so far in places i have worked that managers have decided to refund people things for like 1 - 30 euros without a receipt simply because they rather take the small loss then and there but keep a customer than keep the spare change which the customer is nagging about but potentially lose them forever.
Which leads me to not fathom how certain companies just have atrociusly bad customer service. I know americans have places like Comcast who are well known for how bad their customer service is, and on the other hand they have companies like Apple, whom i have heard have pretty good customer service?
I just came to think about this becauase I have just been through the most useless customer service manager trying to get two monitors i bought RMA:d within a reasonable time. So far it's taken three weeks and they are still "in the shop". The amount of effort she is putting in to figure out why it's taking so long, or even apologizing(she hasn't) about why it's taking so long is close to 0. The monitors were both DOA when i got them, so a production fault for sure. And instead of refunding me on the spot(i would have bought new ones at the same place if they did) or give me new monitors, or borrow me two monitors - which infact i have a right to by law in Norway if it takes more then a week to fix them, they decide to ship them over to Samsung to try and fix them. It's not like they broke after a month or week then i'd buy a repair would be in place. But they were not functioning when i got them at all.
Poll: How much does customer service factor in where you spend your money?A lot - it's big deciding factor (30) 70% Medium - I care about it but it doesn't completely dictate my choices (9) 21% Not much - I don't really take it into account when i shop. (4) 9% 43 total votes Your vote: How much does customer service factor in where you spend your money? (Vote): A lot - it's big deciding factor
(Vote): Medium - I care about it but it doesn't completely dictate my choices
(Vote): Not much - I don't really take it into account when i shop.
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Depends on the company/service/product.
Also, a lot of people don't use a company's customer service at all. So while some companies have terrible customer service, many people might just be satisfied with the product.
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Depends on the prize of the product/service I want to buy/purchase. I had a shitload of trouble earlier this year when my laptop display broke. MSI support was terrible, I'm sure I'm not gonna buy crap from them ever again, nor would I recommend anyone to do that. Outrageously stupid company.
It took them a complete 1,5 weeks to inspect my laptop (my monitor started to either shrink/develope black bars or the pic would distort heavily). On their first attempt they sent it back saying it was just me inventing stuff. Needless to say, the very same problem occured two minutes after I tried it again to double check.
The second time, when I immediately returned the laptop to their so-called service they worked on it 3,5 weeks to figure out that a cable was lose. I could've basically fixed that myself, if it wasn't for "don't open the laptop or you lose guarantee" policy. I was also not allowed to get a certified technician to have a look in one of their outlet shops only 30 kms away from here - no it had to go all the way to somewhere in Soviet Russia.
The sick thing was that they never actually tried to tell me when I could expect the thing back on their own, I had to spend about 6 hours in total on the phone (which I forced them to pay me back, it was about 90$ in the end) to get the info it wouldn't take longer than one week - that was at the end of week two. It took me about ten additional mails back and forth to finally get some custom relationship manager (or whatever they call these people) that could actually speed up the process and tell me in Spam-Mail-English how sorry he was for the problems they caused. At least they agreed to pay some sort of compensation for this giant fuck up.
I was really, really, really pissed, especially when I saw that their technician repaired more shit than he needed to, things that weren't on their list and on top of it all - not broken. They also formated my HDD, even when it was not needed, because, fuck, a cable was lose, then installed a Vista Trial, for which I had no key because it sucks (format again!), instead of the Win 7 it originally came with (I mean there is even the sticker ON THE FREAKING LAPTOP).
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I will go out of my way to bring my business back to a place that left a good impression on me.
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I always like supporting places that have better customer service. But in terms of deciding where I spend my money, if the items are good and the price is right, I don't worry about the service much.
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Even though it depends on the item/price as many have said already, on the majority of things, it plays a big factor in my decision
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Thing is most companies customer service is really shitty because they try to lower their prices.
So we got people complaining about shit customer service after buying really low cost items.
Yes it's really annoying when you encounter a problem and need to talk to someone but they put you on hold for an hour but sadly even the most prestigious companies do that now because they assume (probably right) that lower prices benefit the most people.
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I work as a CS manager for our International team and I can tell you that when people are worried about something, or receive any item or service that is not to their expecting the low level employee's who typically can be overlooked even by the company can make or break whether that customer stays or leaves. No company is in it's own market by itself so if you lose 1 customer they go elsewhere, and take some time to look at how expensive it is to attain 1 new customer compared to what it costs a company to keep 1 customer, because it will shock you how expensive it is to attain 1 customer, compared to retaining 1.
I think if a company can't put together 20-30 people who can ensure that their customers feel respected and heard then another company will just out do them and support is one of the most tedious jobs you can have, but one of the cogs of the company that can cause as many problems as solutions if not handled correctly.
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On August 04 2012 03:33 Jerrybear wrote:
I work as a CS manager for our International team and I can tell you that when people are worried about something, or receive any item or service that is not to their expecting the low level employee's who typically can be overlooked even by the company can make or break whether that customer stays or leaves. No company is in it's own market by itself so if you lose 1 customer they go elsewhere, and take some time to look at how expensive it is to attain 1 new customer compared to what it costs a company to keep 1 customer, because it will shock you how expensive it is to attain 1 customer, compared to retaining 1.
I think if a company can't put together 20-30 people who can ensure that their customers feel respected and heard then another company will just out do them and support is one of the most tedious jobs you can have, but one of the cogs of the company that can cause as many problems as solutions if not handled correctly.
Yes this is a policy many of the places i have worked at have had - keep the costumer over arguing over a few dollars. And it's one i think is smart since there is no way im buying from these guys again when there's a competitors with similar prices that i have RMA'd stuff to before and it's taken at its max a little over a week with them actually apologizing and like, being friendly. And especially when i've spent a few thousands euros at this place(never had to go to customer support until now) and they still dont have the decency to compensate me/try to help me.
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For the most part, I don't notice it unless it is particularly good or particularly bad. If it is really good, such as restaurants with interesting/funny/helpful/kind waiters, I will frequent that place. If the waiters are unhelpful or rude, then I most likely will avoid that place.
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Service counts, especially when you're paying a large sum of money for the product. For example, I've had very good customer service experiences with Asus. Even though my laptop's motherboard burnt out twice (lol), they replaced the components really quickly. Thus, I've stuck with them and my second laptop is also from Asus.
On the other hand, United Airlines has the WORST service ever. Delayed flights, lost luggage, bad staff attitude.. you name it. My complaint that I wrote 2 weeks ago hasn't been replied. Never flying with them ever again.
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It's very important to me. I don't give my business to people that make me feel disrespected. Good customer service is the difference between me shopping around and remaining loyal to a business.
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It's hard to find out about customer service until the first time you need it. As far as individual products go I simply purchase with my credit card. If a company doesn't live up to a warranty or claim, I simply file a credit card dispute. Easy money back. No hassle. Try simply mentioning this over the phone, and alot of the time it makes the company get their shit together.
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On August 04 2012 08:21 FullNatural wrote:
It's hard to find out about customer service until the first time you need it. As far as individual products go I simply purchase with my credit card. If a company doesn't live up to a warranty or claim, I simply file a credit card dispute. Easy money back. No hassle. Try simply mentioning this over the phone, and alot of the time it makes the company get their shit together.
Really that simple to get it approved or whatever?
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EVGA has my money if I plan to buy a motherboard or graphics card any time soon.
Customer service counts. RMA was as simple as ship, 1-2 days inspect/test, ship out another part.
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Always remember with any support, even if it is a waiter, or your talking to an IT person because your game/computer will not work, it is still a person. I know that the support talks about the exact same issues over and over, and your not a new thing that has never been seen even if you are told, that they have never seen it. So if that day that person happened to have their significant other break up with them, or as many cs rep's are students they might be studying for a test and talking to you.
Remember if you are over the age of 25 you are probably talking to someone younger than you trying to have a job and school.
I will give everyone a tip towards support, Do Not Ask to Speak to a Manager or Supervisor.
I promise if you have that one random problem that needs that type of assistance, the representative you are talking to will pass you on because they know this is out of their area. The #1 thing that I will see is the first answer you get is unacceptable so thinking that talking to someone higher up will help. It doesn't, because that person is the other persons boss so they probably are not going to back down and make their own employee look underminded (unless they were wrong which they are not 99.9% of the time).
The "Managers/Higher level people" in support DO NOT deal with daily stuff, they deal with bigger picture things, so talking to them is actually talking to someone who does not answer these questions daily to customers, and do not want to take the time answering them because guess what THEY HIRED the person you were talking to and will most likely just agree with their employee once their answer is double checked as correct. If you actually contact support enough that they know your first name, then they have an inside joke about you and they actually probably do not want to speak with you, but there are exceptions if you are just overly fun person to speak with, type to, or however you are in contact.
*TLDR: Remeber that Customer Support reps you talk to are probably younger or your age, doing the same thing you are only at work while you are not. They are not lying, or do not have the ability to do what you want when you ask to speak to their manager, it doesn't help, since companies have same policies across all people no matter your title.
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Customer service matters A LOT to me. Especially when it comes to buying food from local shops. In Chinatown in Boston there's a drink bar and a bakery I frequent quite often during school.
Sometimes I have nice little pleasant chat with them while they bring out my drink or checkout my pastry. Its little things like that that make the day so much better. Because if you were to just go on your own usual routine you'd feel like a Zerg drone mining minerals back and forth from the line and the hatchery with no social awareness whatsoever. Then eventually you'll get turned into an evo chamber or some shit which sucks.
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EPT
