I certainly don't do myself any favours when dealing with obstinate officials. After a fight on the phone (all my fights are on the phone!) on Monday with my bank, today I had, shall we say, a small contretemps with Technical Support at Adobe Systems (the software giant). The bank fight was over the extortionate commission they wanted to charge me and I told them that it was pretty clear why their stock price had plummeted if they treated their customers like that. He very politely told me I could, of course, "bank somewhere else" if I wasn't happy with their service. I took great pleasure in telling him I'd be staying - my thinking being shitty banks deserve bolshie customers.
The Adobe fight was trivial but once again I couldn't help rubbing it in and telling them "you know your reputation in the market is as bad as Microsoft for customer relations". You'd have thought I would have learned to bite my tongue after all the time I've been here.
Posted by Joe at June 11, 2003 06:19 PMKeep that tongue alive and vocal!
I increasingly find that Japanese are rather crap at customer relations/service, despite an age old image to the contrary. As long as you ask for something they are supposed to or can do they'll do it. But the real test of service is asking the unexpected and seeing how far they will accommodate your request. In Japan that is usually as far as the door that reads 'exit'.
Good luck with the struggle for better customer service. And, by the way, hello from Kuala Lumpur airport!!!
Fusao
Posted by: Fusao at June 11, 2003 07:23 PMWell hello to you at Kuala Lumpur airport! Glad you got there safely.
You are so right about the "exit" attitude. Put another way, they are crap at "thinking outside the box". Without the comfort of the walls of that box all around them, they have great difficulty in performing their duties.
Looking forward to hearing the second leg of your journey went safely as well.
Posted by: Joe at June 11, 2003 07:48 PMSo how did it go with Adobe apart from that? Did you get the disk working?
Posted by: DJ at June 12, 2003 12:34 PMYes, got the disk working with a long workaround. The fight with them was about when my 90 day free support would begin. You get 90 days from your first call to them. They wanted it to start yesterday, but I told them I couldn't even install the program through no fault of my own and they eventually gave in and said it would start from my next support request call to them.
Posted by: Joe at June 12, 2003 02:19 PMCould use a bit more intraline spacing here.
Posted by: DJ at June 13, 2003 04:21 AMA CSS setting I'll be asking you about in the future no doubt. Yoroshiku!
Posted by: Joe at June 13, 2003 07:26 AMPlug: If you need a website get DJ to build one for you. He's the best. :+)
Posted by: Joe at June 13, 2003 10:11 AMMuch improved and thanks for the plug, Joe. Unsolicited, honest foax! (Joe, you'll get the payoff next time I see you.)
Posted by: DJ at June 13, 2003 11:50 AM