SEDO stinks

[devolution]

Even though there are things about Sedo that I have found to be somewhat annoying, not everyone remembers that the staff on the front line such as Joanna and others usually get all the complaints and rude emails about all the stuff that is wrong. And there is often very little they can do except pass on the relevant info to the higher departments etc. Having had experience in a customer facing position a while back, I know how hard it can be sometimes to have to listen to some of the rants and raves, and to not take things personally.
It's like the Banks etc. - the people at the counters are just doing their best, trying to earn their living to feed their families, but it's the fat shareholders and corrupt executives that are the ones that should be taking the heat and crap for when things foul up. Yet they get paid the highest salaries just to lie around on a yacht all day when the people at the front desk have to deal with their incompetence! That's why I figure it's usually impossible to get through to the chiefs and upper executives of companies, because they know people are annoyed.... IMHO, they are cowards...

 

[retired_member12]

...It's like the Banks etc. - the people at the counters are just doing their best, trying to earn their living to feed their families, but it's the fat shareholders and corrupt executives that are the ones that should be taking the heat and crap for when things foul up...

I'm sorry Devolution, but that's not how anyone should consider how customer service works. People on the first rung play just as much of a role in poor customer service as anyone else in a company, and it's a bad habit to get into whereby you only blame the top level. All levels within a company are accountable, without exception.
Take your use of the banks as a comparison. You realise of course that counter staffs are just as incentivised to offer products & services by way of bonuses as anyone else in their company? the "Can I interest you..." questions all have bonuses behind them, and when you hear them ask the same question to every customer in their queue, you soon see that their only objective is to hit the numbers and grab the bonus, usually £10 - £50 for a conversion.
When it comes to complaining, there is nothing worse than listening to some nomark at the other end of the telephone speak down to you and clearly lie and talk bulls&@t in a superior fashion, in an attempt to cover up for their companys' mistakes. You shouldn't put up with it, period!
Yes, executives are able to hide behind their legal teams and advisors when someone lower down the tree f*@ks up, but only against the ignorant majority. If you know what you're doing, and have the patience to see things through, then usually you can get a satisfactory result. It may not be the result you want, but if poor service exists, it should be 'outed'.

 

[sedo]

Hi Gio

You should have received an email directly from me resolving the issue.

Please respond directly to me and not via acorn.

Kind regards

Joanna
[email protected]

 

[devolution]

As someone that actually was on a profit-share/incentive-based salary, I can attest that even though I was in a B2B rather than B2C firm, I still often felt uncomfortable asking my 'customers' (businesses) if they wanted to get "this latest product or service". Isn't that what the salesmen are supposed to do?

Let's take our 1&1 experiences, for example. Who hires the staff that don't know what the heck is going on? The management. Who decides the policies that screw you and me? The management. Who doesn't do anything even with the threat of legal action? The management.
The customer service staff are only operating under orders and oversight of the management. If they are telling customers b/s, then it's because they were told to by the management or lose their job. The only other reason is because they weren't trained to answer technical questions. And guess who decided not to train them? Yep, the management

The regular staff at the bottom of the rung really can't do anything to deal with complaints other than pass them on... And say "We're terribly sorry sir," etc.
So it's not really their fault. Maybe if they last long enough and get into the higher echelons, they might remember their experiences and say "hey...this customer service sucks... lets make it better..." But as we have all learned, most of the customer service departments are in Timbuktu now, so they have no chance of getting into the management which is based in another country... And who decided that? (To save money - sod the existing workers in the UK or US who lost their jobs.) Management....