Bad Customer Service

I shop on the Internet.  A lot.  I don't know how I survived before it.  Shopping is not a social event for me--I want to get stuff quickly, quietly, and without complication.  I don't particularly like wandering around from store to store aimlessly looking without purpose to try things on in a space where 10 other women are doing the same thing while having private conversations with their "girlfriends" in the stall next to them.  I don't want to hear about your husband's foot fetish porn addiction.  Whatever happened to keeping certain things private?

The one downside to this otherwise glorious method of avoiding human interaction is returns. Unless I want to pay to have it shipped back (thank you Zappos for being the exception), I must still visit the brick and mortar store to handle most returns.

 There are two traits that I absolutely cannot stand in another person--stupid and lazy.  And lazy has permeated the local store that I happen to frequent most.

It started out innocently enough, I walk up to the counter with my bag of rejects and ask to return them.  The girl immediately informs me that I can make returns anywhere in the store.  I politely say thanks, even though I already knew this but I come to the customer service department because its what I prefer.  I walk through the store on my way to the "customer service" department--I rarely see someone on the floor who's not already helping someone else.

I get this routine from 2-3 girls at the counter of the next couple of months.  Finally, I push back a little.  Immediately trying to send this return to the floor, I tell her that she's told me this three times now and that I prefer coming to this counter.  I thought maybe if I pointed it out to her politely, she'd figure out that part of customer service is handling this stuff?  I'm not entirely sure, but if someone did that to me I would step back and remember that is part of my job and be a little bit embarrassed I'd represented the company I worked for so poorly.  This was not the case for these girls.

The past two visits, I've been told by girls who were on the phone (one might have actually been helping someone, the other was very obviously having a bitch-fest with a coworker in another department) that if I wanted to return something I'd need to see a sales associate.  The first time, I was a little shocked and just stood there and stared at her for a moment before leaving.  The second time, you would have had to been a complete moron to not notice I was perturbed--this was the bitch fest.  Ironically, the same floor sales associate handled the returns for me on the floor both times.  She was incredibly polite, very helpful, and even stopped the restocking she was doing once to help me out.  So the second time, I asked her what the deal was with their customer service department employees turning people away with returns?

I know it was a little unfair, but she handled it brilliantly.  She apologized, didn't throw them under the bus, and even tried to offer an excuse for them to make sure the company's reputation wasn't tarnished.  If she was having a bad day, I would never know it.  If she ever wants out of retail, I would hire her on that basis alone.

So, why am I writing what was is basically a long-winded whine session?  Well, this particular company is world renowned for its eagerness to help and please a customer.  In most cases they live up to that reputation.  And I have some returns that I've been putting off because I really don't want to deal with the chance of getting one of these lazy girls.  If I have to deal with one of them, my politeness has run out and I know I'm going to say something tacky and crass.  I'll ask specifically for her name, write it down in front of her so she knows I won't forget, and then I'll write a letter to the store manager letting him/her know how poorly this person represents their brand.

I've hit that point where social decorum no longer matters to me and I'm going to be the bitch that gets them in trouble.  I strongly dislike people who work in a job with "customer service" in the description and decide it's at best an afterthought.  I realize it's probably not their dream career, and that's fine.  I know it's not the only thing they do all day.  I'm not expecting them to jump over the moon and kiss my ass, just that they not make me feel like I'm inconveniencing them by walking up.  I'm merely asking that these ladies not be employees who put more effort into getting out of work than it would take to do their job decently.

What's the saying--for every good experience you have, you tell three people and for every bad you tell ten?  Tomorrow, to balance things out I think I'll discuss the people who've gone above and beyond when they didn't have to, and how it's impacted my business relationship with them.  I can't be a bitch all the time, right?  (Please don't answer that.)