[237] in Humor
HUMOR - Dave: The customer is always right
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (abennett@MIT.EDU)
Sat Apr 30 23:30:51 1994
From: abennett@MIT.EDU
Date: Sat, 30 Apr 94 23:29:22 -0400
To: humor@MIT.EDU
The customer is always right
by Dave Barry
> TODAY'S CONSUMER TOPIC IS: How to resolve a dispute with a
>large company.
> If you're a typical consumer -- defined as "a consumer
>whose mail consists mainly of offers for credit cards that he or
>she already has" -- chances are sooner or later you're going to
>have a dispute with a large company. You're going to call the
>company up, and you're going to wind up speaking with people in a
>department with a friendly name such as "Customer Service."
>These people hate you.
> I don't mean they hate you PERSONALLY. They hate the
>public in general, because the public is forever calling them up
>to complain.
> I know whereof I speak. I used to be -- I am not proud of
>this -- a newspaper editor. This was at a paper in West Chester,
>Pa., called -- I am not proud of this, either -- the "Daily Local
>News." We came out daily, and we specialized in local news. For
>example, if Richard M. Nixon resigned the presidency, we'd send
>reporters out to the shopping mall to badger randomly selected
>shoppers into having an opinion about this, and our big headline
>would be: LOCAL RESIDENTS REACT TO NIXON RESIGNATION. As though
>they really were reacting to it, as opposed to trying to find the
>right color bedsheets. This is basically how we handled all news
>(LOCAL RESIDENTS REACT TO DISCOVERY THAT CLAMS MATE FOR LIFE).
> So one spring day I made the editorial decision to put a
>photograph of some local ducks on the front page. At least I
>thought they were ducks, and that's what I called them in the
>caption. But it turns out that they were geese. I know this
>because a WHOLE lot of irate members of the public called to tell
>me so. They never called about, say, the quality of the schools,
>but they were RABID about the duck vs. goose issue. It was almost
>as bad as when we left out the horoscope.
> I tried explaining to the callers that, hey, basically a
>goose is just a big duck, but this did not placate them. Some of
>them demanded that we publish a correction (For whom? The geese?),
>and by the end of the day I was convinced that the public
>consisted entirely of raging idiots. (This is the fundamental
>underlying assumption of journalism.)
> This is what people who answer the phone at, for example,
>the electric company, go through every day. I don't mean that they
>get calls about incorrectly captioned goose photographs, although
>this would not surprise me. I mean that they get an endless stream
>of calls from people who are furious that their electricity got
>turned off just because they failed to pay their bill for 297
>consecutive months, or people asking questions like is it OK to
>operate a microwave oven in the bathtub.
> So let's say that you have a genuine problem with your
>electric bill. The people in "Customer Service" have no way of
>knowing that you,re an intelligent, rational person. They're going
>to lump you in with the whining non-rocket-scientist public. As
>far as they're concerned, the relevant facts, in any dispute
>between you and them, are these:
> 1. They have a bunch of electricity.
> 2. You need it.
> 3. So shut up.
> This is why, more and more, the people in "Customer
>Service" won't even talk to you. They prefer to let you interface
>with the convenient Automated Answering System until such time as
>you die of old age ("... if your FIRST name has more than eight
>letters, and your LAST name begins with 'H' through 'L' press 251
>NOW. If your first name has LESS than eight letters, and your last
>name contains at least two 'E's, press 252 NOW. If your ...").
> So is there any way that you, the lowly consumer, can gain
>the serious attention of a large and powerful business? I am
>pleased to report that there IS a way, which I found out about
>thanks to alert reader Jim Ganz Jr., who sent me an Associated
>Press news report from Russia. According to this report, a Russian
>electric company got into a billing dispute with a customer and
>cut off the customer's electricity. This customer, however,
>happened to be a Russian army arsenal. So the commander ordered a
>tank to drive over to the electric company's office and aim its
>gun at the windows. The electricity was turned right back on.
> On behalf of consumers everywhere, I want to kiss this
>arsenal commander on the lips. I mean, what a GREAT concept.
>Imagine, as a consumer, how much more seriously your complaint
>would be taken if you were complaining from inside an armored
>vehicle capable of reducing the entire "Customer Service"
>department to tiny smoking shards. What I am saying is: Forget the
>Automated Answering System. Get a tank.
> Perhaps you are thinking: "But a tank costs several
>million dollars, not including floor mats. I don't have that kind
>of money."
> Don't be silly. You're a consumer, right? You have credit
>cards, right?
> Perhaps you are thinking: "Yes, but how am I going to pay
>the credit-card company?"
> Don't be silly. You have a tank, right?
>
>(C) 1994 THE MIAMI HERALD
>DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
>
