Due to a busy couple of weeks I’ve neglected the blog, but feel it imperative I offer a follow-up to the Rogers cell phone story.  I’d like to say my own behaviour with Rogers was of the utmost grace and decorum, but the truth is by the time I spoke with someone in authority I was pure ‘ticked off’.  What really struck a chord is the fact it took a public blog before any attention at all was called to this very frustrated customer.

Timeline of Events:

  • 5 Customer Service Representatives who never once clued -in that escalation would be a good idea. When I asked if there was nothing more I could do, they ALL said ‘yes’.
  • Initial tweets were not picked up by social media ‘watchers’ on Twitter before I posted a blog.
  • The Blog drew an enormous amount of attention- many similar negative stories and offers of help from Roger’s competitors.
  • I purchased a phone privately from Kijiji –Rogers “sent it to them for free at their upgrade time but that they did not need it.” (I found that fascinating.)
  • Unfortunately because I had a smart phone I only had a data plan, not a Blackberry plan.  I then spent another entire morning with customer service reps 6 & 7 finding out that I needed to change my plan before the phone woud be operable.
  • I was still on hold with customer service when Rogers finally called in response to the blog (Toronto office).

Talk about your “Shaggy Dog” story – it just seemed to go on forever.  I’ll stick with the phone story and try and avoid going into the ‘lost revenue and business time” saga! (I consult by the hour – can’t get that client time back)

What Worked:

  • When I finally spoke with someone who could help, they recognized the change in data plan would cost me additional funds (more even than a new phone already cost me). A discount of 5.00/mo was given for the additional cost.
  • I got to vent a bit about how this is customer clean-up NOT customer service based on the fact I needed to go public before I EVER got attention.

Things I would never say to a customer:

  • “We go to great expense to provide those free phones up front, we cannot give everything away” – hmm, then you should not be in business, because good business people build their costs into a package.
  • “Our customer service people have to deal with 10 more people just like you once you hang up” – last time I checked, customer service was about caring about the customer you are serving at the moment, especially if they are frustrated.
  • “If you go to our website you will find our escalation policy and could have done that before posting a blog” – That is going to take a LOT of training to get the entire Canadian public to understand how to best escalate an issue.  I wonder if a company might be better off limiting that training to the customer service representatives and offer them clues as to when THEY can escalate an issue.  I struggled to connect with the right CSR multiple times, my expectation was they would indicate a process and simply ask, would you like this to be escalated? I had no idea it was MY job to find out their escalation policy.

No answers or conversations seemed to focus on the real point.  I bought a data plan with Rogers.  The LCD on my data phone stopped functioning correctly.  At no point during my plan was I told my data phone would be obsolete and I would be forced to upgrade to a $4-600.00 BlackBerry and a different plan if my phone was broken. Nor was I informed that even though I HAD a data plan, the only phones available to me would be non-data phones.  I’d like to think if I worked at the company, I would recognize the real issue.

If you offer a service/product (in this case a smart phone data plan) and within that contract your lost or broken program cannot provide the same service or product as agreed to in the beginning, you as a company should be liable to take the lead in finding a solution. Rogers did not provide any smartphones for my data plan at this point in my contract.  BUT according to Rogers, the problem is all mine.  I am stuck with THEIR provision of this service (even though they can no longer provide what they agreed to in the beginning) and any solution is a new phone at full (or close to full) cost at my own expense or to downgrade to a non-data phone but still pay the data fee as per the contract.  If I try removing myself from the contract I pay a hefty penalty – but they hold no such accountability.

I am still with Rogers only because I did not wish to pay that penalty and throw my money in the trash.  The loss of time, money and patience is now history – but serves as a great model of what NOT to do in my own company and with my own clients.  Will I renew with Rogers? Time will tell, I will definitely ask many more questions of any provider next time I agree to a contract.  Do they need a better customer service solution – indeed I think they do.

In this case, a free phone was only a ‘hook’ to gaining an initial contract – certainly discounted phones are not used as a  solution to maintaining service and keeping a customer who likes to be loyal to the companies with whom she has chosen to spend her money.

(Update: August 31, 2009 – Call from “Office of the President” at Roger’s with additional discount to account to say sorry for the experience.  This individual was polite, considerate, wants to use these posts as an example for continued front-line training and apologized quite a few times.  It is clear that they are doing what they can in the aftermath of this particular situation. I hope his optimistic description of the changes they wish to make on the front-lines does materialize for the benefit of other customers so they can avoid an experience like this altogether.)