From the Observation Deck

I continued my travels through the USA the other weekend with a road trip through a pretty part of Virginia. Once you get out of the Northern Virginia suburban cities and away from the toxins (meaning the cars not the politics, although a break from that is nice, too), mad drivers, and mini malls, you get to see in the distance the Blue Ridge mountains. It’s the beginning of fall but the colors haven’t really changed yet, so maybe another trip in a week or two would be good for the soul.

I have to admit I did not realize there were so many wineries in Virginia. The vineyards dot the landscape along with the dark fences and gently sloping hills. And I blew through Madison County but did not see any bridges. I ended up in Charlottesville but did not get to see the famous historical landmarks. Maybe next time I’ll visit Monticello and Montpelier.

This visit was reserved for catching up with friends, which I told you about in a previous post. On my way home on Sunday I took my time and stopped along the road to take some pretty photographs of the area just east of the Shenandoah Valley. I also have a thing about taking photos of small post offices. So I got plenty of them driving through rural Virginia.

I encourage you out-of-towners to visit VA and those who live here to take some drives around this beautiful Commonwealth.

Last weekend I went out to Middleburg, VA with some friends to watch the steeplechase races. It’s a really fun experience if you’ve never done it before. Imagine hanging outside in beautiful weather overlooking a large, green field with mountains dotting the landscape. There you are laughing with friends, eating catered food, and drinking wine and good beer. It’s tailgating but dressed better. Every half hour there’s some action to watch. Betting is done within groups and everyone puts two dollars into pot.

This year I won the first race. My strategy is simple. I look at the statistics of the horse’s previous races, the jockey’s record, and how they look in the paddock. Okay I’m kidding; I pick the horses based on their name and what “speaks” to me. Erin Go Bragh spoke to me because I’m part Irish and it’s always cool to bet on the Irish. So I split that pot with three others and managed to lose all the remaining races. My friend’s eleven year old won the biggest pot that day and walked off with all our hard earned dollars. Maybe I would have done better if I wasn’t relying so much on the advice of her three year old sister.

One thing about betting is that you need to be prepared to lose. I am a huge competitor so it did irk me when in the fourth race my horse came in last place. But it’s really fun to see them sprinting down the stretch. They are beautiful, powerful animals and it’s exciting to see them go.

I don’t really have any funny thoughts or deep insights on this. Just reflections on a nice Saturday afternoon in Virginia. And my fingers are crossed for tonight’s mega-millions drawing. Tootles!

Down the stretch

My advisor

I have already talked about customer service in another post but feel it’s necessary to do so again. I’m sure all of you have had your share of less-than-stellar service from people you are paying to help you and I would love to hear your stories. This is a tale of my most recent experience and I’ll start off by saying that I don’t heart Cox Communications. Not at all.

First of all, I find it reeeeaaaaaalllly hard to believe that they have been given awards for good customer service. I don’t know who voted for them or any of the methodology involved in the research that backs that claim, but I think it must be a sham. It has to be. Let me tell you why.

First, I’ve had dealings before with the customer service people in their office near my home and they treated me as if I was interfering with their donut break and that I was the stupidest person on earth because I couldn’t read their minds and didn’t know all of their policies by heart. That was before. This last experience was so bad it was comical. I can’t make this stuff up.

Tuesday

I go into their office and talk to the pleasant customer service lady about how I need a cable card for my TiVo. She says, “A technician has to come out.” “Okay,” I say. After lots of typing we make an appointment. I say, “I have a TiVo, so do I need to do anything or does the technician need anything for that?” She replies, “No, they’ll have everything they need.”

Thursday

The appointment was set for 10 a.m. –12 noon. When no one showed up I called Cox.

• Me: “Hello, I had an appointment for a technician to come out 10 a.m. –12 noon.” Pause here because there was no response. “No one showed up.”
• Alicia, the customer service lady: “Hold on.” “Okay, they’ll be there at 11:47.”
• Me: “It’s 12:18.”
• Alicia: “It’s 12:18?”
• Me: “Yes.”
• Alicia: “Hold on.” “Okay, they’ll call you in about five to 10 minutes to let you know when they’re coming.”

Thirty minutes later the phone rang and I got an automated message saying that a technician would be arriving soon. When the technicians finally arrived, they did not have the proper equipment with them.

• Technician: “Oh, you have a TiVo. We need a converter box for that.”
• Me: “I told the customer service person about it and mentioned that specifically.”
• Technician: “Yeah well, customer service didn’t put that on the work order.”

So basically, they had to come back later that night and still couldn’t finish it because I had not gotten the set up done ahead of time (something that the technician told me that customer service should have told me about).

Friday

So third time’s a charm and on Friday morning they came back to place two little cards in the two little slots in my TiVo. Seriously? I needed two guys to do that job? I really need to get a union job. That way I can hang out with pals and blame all the crap on customer service.

The Following Week

Now just to add a bit more fuel to this burning disaster, I also switched my phone over to Cox because the geniuses in their pricing department figured it out so that if I added a service, my bill would be ten dollars less than it currently was. I understand pricing and bundling and have worked out some complicated pricing structures myself, but that one doesn’t quite seem like a logical way to run a business. But so be it. The customer service guy I talked to told me that the phone guy would be coming out in a nice short window of time, 1–9 p.m. After my steep intake of breath he told me that I would be getting a call one hour prior to the arrival of the technician so I wouldn’t be trapped all day. I did get a phone call. From a customer service rep telling me that the technician was knocking on my door and there was no answer. Thanks for the one-hour warning call Cox, you managed to screw up yet again.

Final Conclusions

Is your left hand talking to your right? Are the executives, marketers, finance personnel, etc. talking to your front line personnel? Are you hiring competent workers and training them properly? From my perspective there are a lot of companies out there that need to seriously work on their customer service skills. Because after all, it’s just your brand image that’s being shattered. And that usually translates into less revenue and bad reviews on blogs. So there. And while the phone guy was still in my house I got a cutomer service follow-up survey call from Cox. I told them the job wasn’t finished yet and we hung up. But because I didn’t get a call back, I’ll express my opinions now. You stink Cox.