Category: Customer Service

Waking Up in Abandoned Hospital? Customer Support Line?

Some pretty good science fiction books and movies have started with a person waking up in an abandoned hospital. Complex. Confusing. That’s how I approach phoning any large consumer call center. I treat it as a bizarre game. It goes without saying that I’ve already exhausted searching their web site.*  When you call, the first challenge is attempting to make the interactive voice-response (IVR) system to do your bidding. Different ways of asking or pressing menu options sometimes works. When it does, that’s victory. When that doesn’t work, the next challenge is to get past the IVR to an agent. (Some companies like Comcast make this very difficult.**) Before you can actually speak with an agent, you’ll hear a recording asking how ignorant you are: “Did you know that many tasks can be accomplished on our website?” Finally, speaking with an agent is often like finding the one other person in the abandoned hospital. They are just as dazed and confused as you are.*** They might know about secret rooms (transferring your call), but some of these secret rooms have no answers.

Drowning in Data, but No Insight

What’s the solution? This is yet another example of most companies are drowning in data gathering but don’t know how to use it. Somehow the Pareto Principle has fallen out of favor. We’ve all experienced it. It’s where we get the phase “80/20 rule.” Roughly 80 percent of your effects/defects come from 20 percent of causes/problems. But it’s hard to imagine that any customer call center has an analytics team who can identify customer call trends. Take for example that recording pleading with you to visit the website. Would it be so hard to ask: “Have your been to our website? Press 1 for yes, 2 for no.” This data point would provide a powerful spotlight on content that’s missing or too difficult to find on the website. It would also treat callers with the basic dignity that you don’t think of them as totally ignorant Luddites.

Are you wondering if I think any call centers are very good? Yes, there are excellent call centers. The United Healthcare call center is at the top of my list. The first contact people are off-shore, but very well trained and professional. Insurance benefits in the US are very complex. The first contact people know how to patch in the right people if needed.

The Uncanny Valley is Horsefeathers

Are you wondering if I know about “the uncanny valley”? Certainly I do. However, the American Express virtual agent suffers from a totally different problem than “the uncanny valley.” They gave the system a human name “Ava” and licensed the absolute best speech production and recognition. It’s my opinion that Ava has the conversational skills of a 13-year old boy barely passing his English class.**** The sound of the voice is young, perky, and professional, but “her” responses are fiercely tactical and argumentative. My guess is that they delegated the “conversation” scripts to one of the most junior people on the team. Would anyone buy at $400,000+ Lamborgini Aventador and then let a 13-year old drive it? It surely seems like hundreds of thousands were spent on the best technology, but human implementation was done on the cheap. ::sigh:: This is not the first time I’ve noticed something like this.

Notes

*I once overheard a frustrated coworker on the phone with a call center agent say: “I’d rather shower in prison than use your call center, but I have no other choice.” Yikes (and LOL).

**With Comcast IVR, if you’re calling from a mobile phone and ask to speak with an agent, the IVR terminates the call. (!?) Then an SMS chatbot initiates a session. Of course, the chat bot can only handle the same exact things as the IVR, so eventually the chat bot has to give up and put in a queue for a call back by a human agent. Again, would it be so hard to ask: Have you tried using our website? 1 Yes. 2 No.

***While I respect that being a call center rep is not easy, they are often at the mercy of scripts which – wait for it – are no better than the content on the website. Also, a very large company will have separate departments to deal with different types of problems. I call these “secret rooms” because you cannot call them directly. You must go through a first-contact agent.

****When Ava first launched, “she” was programmed to start the session by introducing herself: “Hello, I’m Ava…” However if you responded with “Hi, I’m Andrew,” the response was “I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean.” In normal, human conversation when someone introduces themselves, the other person should, too. The correct response should have been: “Hello, Andrew. How may I help you today?”

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Why Oh Why Didn’t You Sign Up for the Free Trial?

So far, I’ve received 6 letters in the mail from SiriusXM (and many more emails) because my new car has a SiriusXM capable radio. First they begged me to start a free trial that came with my new car. I did not do this. Then they warned me that the trial would soon be over. Then they started begging me to subscribe even though my trial had expired. Not once did they offer me any explanation of what, how, or why I might want SiriusXM.

Previously, I have written that many product managers unwittingly take the approach that only customers smart enough to understand their technology should be allowed to buy it. Something else seems to be going on with SiriusXM. It seems like they believe if you just try it, you’ll love it. It reminds of some of the most challenging video games. There’s very little instruction or explanation. Part of the fun is figuring things out on your own.

One huge problem with this approach is that it’s leaving a lot of money on the table. There are many, many video games collecting dust on shelves. One of my good friends once said, “If a game gets too complicated or confusing, I just stop playing it.”

True, true.

But when it comes to revenue and customer satisfaction, I don’t believe this is a good approach.

So far, I haven’t received any communication from SiriusXM asking me why I didn’t take them up on the free trial.

I wonder how prevalent this approach is? Many companies offer free versions of their software, but I wonder if they follow-up with people who don’t take them up on their offer to ask why? (Or, if the customer abandons the free trail, do they follow up to ask why?)

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Extreme Corporate Laziness?

I’m all for avoiding unnecessary work. I got an email from the bank that issues my airline credit card. They wanted me to provide updated housing and income information.

Naturally, I suspected this was a phishing scam. But, a careful review of the email headers and links showed they were truly from the bank in question.

So, it got me to thinking: What a bunch lazy so-and-so’s.* On the surface that might seem like a mundane request. However, this particular bank also has the mortgage on my house, receives my payroll check through ACH automatic deposit, and provides me with a free credit score every month. If anyone should know my housing and income situation it’s the very bank asking for these data.

To compound the laziness, every year I get a pamphlet that reminds me I cannot opt-out of the bank sharing information with their subsidiaries and vendors who provide contracted services. For example, I cannot opt-out of the retail banking division sharing my payroll deposit status with the credit-card division. Likewise, I cannot opt-out of the mortgage services division sharing my mortgage status with the credit-card division.

Alas, it appears that banks simply do not leverage customer information to provide a unified and integrated user experience. Despite the trillions of dollars banks have invested in computer systems, we are still stuck in the 1980s when it comes to customer service. Call the wrong department and one is flatly told “I cannot help you.” Sometimes they won’t even transfer you, but make you hang-up and call a different number.

The dictionary definition of “lazy” is “unwilling to work or use energy.” Yes, that seems to fit in my opinion.

* My 7th grade homeroom teacher never lost his temper nor used an obscenity. “So-and-so’s” was his all purpose phrase for those beneath contempt (lol). I used it in my blog post our respect for this fine man.

 

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Bank Stupidity?

This really happened:

Thank you for calling [bank-name] lending services, how may I help you?

Hello, someone is using my name, social security number, and date of birth to fraudulently apply for credit cards with your bank.

May I please verify your name, social security number, and date of birth?

After a moment of stunned silence, I explained: Yes, but, that’s the info the fraudsters are using to fraudulently attempt fraud by fraudulently impersonating me for fraudulent purposes.

Sir, I cannot help you if you won’t verify your identity.

Does this qualify as stupidity? The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines stupidity as “the state of being foolish or unintelligent.”

My late father used to observe: “Ignorance can be fixed, but stupidity cannot.”

Suggestion:

When a customer wants to report identity theft, fraud, or any of the like, the alternative “out-of-wallet” verification should be used. That method is far from perfect, but it at least it wouldn’t make a customer wonder about your company’s intelligence.

Note: “Out-of-wallet” is the jargon for asking questions based on an individual’s credit report. This is called “out-of-wallet” because it attempts to circumvent nefarious actions by people who find a lost bank card. The lost card is “out-of-wallet.”

Also note: My guess is that most banks are like this, so the specific bank’s name isn’t really that important.

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First-Name Basis?

Nothing reveals corporate sloppiness more than addressing customers by a name they do not use. I’m referring to the rampant practice by interactive  voice response (IVR) units and customer call center personnel using the first name datum in all customer interactions. I know many people — including some of the most successful people in the world — who use a nickname or their middle name socially and professionally:

FirstName-PolitenessMan

It’s Larry Ellison, not Lawrence

. . . Mary Kay Ash, not Mary Ash

. . . Zig Ziglar, not Harry Ziglar.

Maybe in the interests of national security, these people use their legal name on airplane tickets and opening banks accounts, but that isn’t the same as giving permission to use that legal first name. Good customer service demands that companies make a note of a person’s preferred name in their data bases. It’s a minimal courtesy.

Also, as the customer, people should be allowed to opt-out of “first-name basis.” Again, it should be very easy to store this option in the data base.

My blessed mother had an interesting approach to this situation. When customer service reps or shop clerks would attempt to address her by her first name she would cheerfully say: “Oh, please feel free to call me Mrs. Minko.” She wasn’t scolding people, just indicating her preference.

>>> Update: On a related note, when it comes to speech-to-text voicemail transcription, an end-user name should be spelled correctly. For example, if a person’s name is spelled Jaymes and the voicemail is being transcribed to text, then the way Jaymes spells the name should be used. Yes, this is an extra step in the speech-to-text process, but it matters.

Adventures in Customer Service #24,681

One morning I found someone’s ATM card on the sidewalk. It was only a few blocks out of my way, so walked to one of the branch offices of the bank that issued the card. I tried to give it to one of the platform officers who was standing at the printer. I said: “I found this on the sidewalk on 16th Street.”

With a look of exasperation she said, “Well, actually, you should . . .” but she didn’t complete that thought. Instead she made a pivot and said, “I’ll take it.”

I wonder if this is an example of a growing trend that only pre-defined problems can be addressed. If something out of the ordinary happens, it automatically splits into two problems. Whatever the customer thinks is a problem, plus the obstacle that the customer service person doesn’t want to deal with it. (In my case, I’m not even the customer, so perhaps that makes for a third obstacle: No obligation if you’re not a customer?)

I tried to ask what the correct procedure should have been by prompting: “If you want me to do something else, I will.”

With a tone of weary defeat in her voice, she only repeated: “I’ll take it.”

To be fair, this particular branch is a wonderful corporate member of my neighborhood community. They host in their courtyard the annual holiday tree presented by the merchant’s association. The corner of their building has a faux balcony about 3 feet off the ground. They have never challenged the long-standing community practice of posting memorials on the balcony rail of community friends who have passed away.

Also to be fair, I may have interrupted at a bad time. Heaven knows that when a printer is acting up, the last thing I want is someone interrupting me (LOL).

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