things i like: June 2006

Wrangling with customer service representatives is an art form, but you can do it successfully with a little knowledge and a stubborn streak.

By Liz Pulliam Weston

It’s time to get mad.Almost every day, I get another e-mail or letter from someone who has suffered some outrage at the hands of a company, usually one that purports to care about customer service. But instead of being livid, most of these folks are resigned to bad treatment and just want to know how to minimize the damage.Here’s an example. Willi Sommer is a Navy submariner stationed in Italy. AT&T took a $425 payment Sommer made to his direct-bill calling card account and applied it, in error, to his mother’s wireless account.

Any company can make a mistake, of course. What counts is how the company fixes it.AT&T fixed Sommer by turning his account over to a collections agency. This is after Sommer sent the company copies of the cashed check and spent hours on overseas phone calls with AT&T customer-service reps.

When AT&T finally realized its mistake, it gave Sommer a credit -- but only for the amount of the payment that his mother hadn’t already “spent.”You don’t have to take it anymoreI’d love to tell you AT&T’s version of these events. I tried for days to get one of their public-relations people to speak to me about this. Instead, I got transferred from one PR type to another, but nobody was willing to admit that this problem fell within his or her purview.

Sommer had been dealing with this nonsense for six months. It’s no wonder he became numb. All he was hoping for when he contacted me was suggestions for fixing his credit report. He’d long since given up hope that AT&T would actually give back the money it took or that it would apologize for treating him so shabbily.

It’s time to fight back.

You really can win

I’m here to tell him, and you, that we just don’t have to take it anymore. So what if customer service keeps getting worse -- you can complain effectively, and get results. You just have to know how.

Know your rights. Sometimes companies get away with egregious behavior simply because its victims don’t know the law. It’s illegal, for example, for a company to knowingly report false credit information, or for collection agencies to keep calling you after you’ve told them in writing to stop. Knowing the law -- and letting the companies know you know -- is sometimes effective in getting bad behavior to stop.

If your complaint involves a contract, warranty or guaranty, read all the fine print that came with it. You don’t necessarily have to limit yourself to the remedies prescribed in these documents, but you should at least know what the company promised.

Know what you want. Be clear in your mind and in all your communications with the company about what you want to happen. That way you won’t get sidetracked.After all, the customer-service rep’s job, typically, is not to make you happy. It’s to get you off the phone.

If the rep suggests ways to fix your problem at all, it will usually be ways that don’t cost her or the company much. When my new laptop’s hard drive failed for the second time last month, Dell wanted to send me yet another replacement part. But I knew from the start of my call that I wasn’t getting off the phone until a replacement computer was on its way.

I’m assuming, by the way, that what you want is both reasonable and doable. Your definition of those two terms may vary from the company’s, but you can’t be ridiculous about it. The dry cleaner that ruined your jacket, for example, should be expected to buy you a new one. You shouldn’t expect free dry cleaning for life.

Be concise. Boil your story down to its essential elements; you might even practice first with a friend before you pick up the phone. Nattering on about irrelevant details will just make it easier for the rep to tune out or miss the point. Besides, you’re going to have to repeat your story over and over and over to get results. Might as well save yourself some time by editing in advance.

Don’t be a jerk. My husband, the most effective complainer I know, puts it this way: You don’t have to be nice, necessarily. You do have to be polite.

Hubby has used this not-nice-but-polite approach to get us a 50% discount on a garage door that was incorrectly installed, a free upgrade on our Tivo service (again, botched installation) and a number of other concessions from companies that initially insisted there was no way to accommodate us.

He isn’t sweet, understanding or particularly patient when he deals with people who resist giving him what he wants. But he is unfailingly civil. Rude behavior just gives the rep an opportunity to hang up on you, or feel justified in not helping you.

I’ve found being nice sometimes greases the wheels. Some reps are so used to being berated by customers that they melt pretty quickly when dealing with someone who’s pleasant. My favorite ploy is to chat them up, then ask them how they would handle my problem if it were theirs, instead of mine. Many times, they’ll respond to this treatment by connecting me with someone who can actually solve my dilemma.

Know that the company’s problems are not your problems. Customer-service reps love to tell you exactly why the company’s procedures don’t allow them to do what you need them to do. Guess what: You don’t have to care. How the company chooses to conduct its business is not your concern. What is your concern is getting your problem fixed, however the company ultimately decides to do it.

Carve out some time. I’m convinced some companies try to wear you out with excessively long hold times. You can’t force them to pick up the phone, but you can fight back by out-waiting them.

Get yourself a portable phone or, better yet, a portable with a headset. That way you can do other things to keep your sanity while waiting for the company to see reason.

It took me three hours on a Saturday morning to persuade Dell to see things my way. I survived innumerable transfers, two disconnects and endless stretches on hold largely because I wasn’t tethered to a desk the whole time. Thanks to my portable head set, I was able to nurse and play with my daughter, sort mail and even do a little light housekeeping while I talked to Sandy, Matt, Phyllis, Jason, Raina and the rest of the Dell crew about how they were going to get me a replacement computer.

Get names and call back numbers. Sometimes, you don’t have three hours in a row to spend on the phone. Rather than start over from the beginning each time you dial, make sure you know how to get back in touch with the people who handled your last call. Having a name and number also comes in handy when you get transferred into voice-mail hell or the phone simply goes dead -- not that a customer-service rep would ever, ever deliberately hang up on you.

Take notes. I don’t know why, but reps are inordinately impressed when you can tell them exactly when you were told what by whom. These details can also help when you’re enlisting others to come to your aid (see below).

When in doubt, get it in writing. Consumer advocates usually recommend putting disputes in writing. The reality is that most problems get handled over the phone, and you don’t necessarily have to conduct business by snail mail.

If the issue involves a lot of money, taxes, legal issues or your credit report, however, put everything in writing and send the letters certified mail, return receipt requested. Keep a log of all your communications with the company and copies of every relevant piece of paper.

Keep moving up the ladder. You probably know that if you can’t get what you want from a phone rep, you should ask to speak to a supervisor. But the folks with the real power may be several rungs up the ladder. If you strike out, try the company’s marketing or public-relations division. A letter sent to the company’s president or CEO can often break through a logjam like nothing else.

If the company is violating the law, you may need to contact the appropriate regulator. You’ll need to do some research to find the right office, and you can’t necessarily count on results. The Federal Trade Commission, for example, collects complaints about credit bureaus, but typically only acts if it sees a pattern of problems emerging.

Desperate measures If you’re having a problem with the government itself, the ultimate resource may be your local, state or federal representative. Many lawmakers pride themselves on taking care of their constituents on this grassroots level.

Then there’s always the option of alerting the media. (Caveat: Don’t alert me -- I’ve got enough to do.) But if the company’s behavior has been particularly terrible or you think you might be part of a trend, you can try calling your local newspaper or television station to see if you can interest them in your plight.

That’s the way one of my former colleagues at the Los Angeles Times discovered that a local phone utility was charging many of its customers for DSL service that didn’t work. The utility kept insisting that there was no problem, or that customer complaints were “isolated incidents.” After the reporter heard from a bunch of “isolated incidents” and wrote a front-page story about them, the company was forced to stop billing people for something they never got.

Finally, you can always hire a lawyer. It’s not the easiest or most cost-effective way to get what you want, but sometimes it pays off.

Real-estate agent Judy Thomas tried for six years to get TransUnion to remove another woman’s bad credit history from her credit report. Thomas finally won a $5.3 million lawsuit against the credit bureau. The judge later reduced the award to $1.3 million, but hey, Thomas made her point.