what is the worst kind of company/organization to have to deal with from a customer service perspective?

CELL PHONE/INTERNET

Utilities. They really don't give a shit if they lose your custom.

with the two major cell phone providers in canada it's almost as if it is designed to make you punch things -- i don't know how many times i would be on the verge of resolving a problem, after no kidding an hour or more on hold (like every time), and then we'd get cut off, or i'd be sent back to square one, just to maintain the tachnical side of things, that's not even taking into account the regular "mistakes" that would appear on and jack up the bill, which you are forced to comb through monthly.

actually it IS designed that way, so that you stop calling and just pay your gigantic bill.

Mobile phone, absolutely no question. 3 specifically. Almost reduced me to tears last month.

I was going to say, "prison", but I guess I'll just vote for insurance.

prison would be under government duh

i'm ficklely voting transportation because of some superirritating dealings with airtran lately

Voted government, tho only because of Post Offices. Generally don't have problems with government service, but Post Offices are horror hellholes. Unfriendliest, unhelpful people ever.

Utilities, hands down. Lying, thieving, not-caring shits on the phone who obv don't know their own company's policies because every one will tell you something different and then transfer you to the "correct" department, who will tell you they don't know what the first person was talking about.

"Insurance" should win this, but probably won't, because

a) y'all are mostly young

b) lucky non-American insurance virgins have no idea.

I'm thinking health insurance here, obv.

gov't is my answer

Cellphone/Internet because you have to talk to IT people wearing headsets, the bitterest people in the world, where every symptom you give for your bad service is turned back on you as something you must have fucked up, you mouth-breathing imbecile.

In short, Yes, I fucking checked to make sure the modem was plugged in before I called you, assshole.

m.v. otm, what little experience ive had w/ insurance companies has been like shoot myself in the face terrible, i cant imagine what it would be like to have a long-term expensive illness

xpost

Yeah I used to work at a telecom company and it was always funny having to call up tech support when my internet connection went out and they'd try and blame it on me and I'd be like I fucking work in the IT dept at this stupid company I know how to shot web.

utilities v communications is a weird divide here...? how are you cutting apart "cell phone" and "phone"? which one includes cable?

yeah i'd just lump those too together as they're equally awful

I mean, as for the others:

finance (bank/credit card) - Seem to take everything I say at face value, no questions asked. I also feel kinda special when I'm buying a brass monkey for my grandmother and Discover feels the need to ask me if I'm sure I am who I think I am at the store.

general retail (like uh stores?) - What time do you close? 9 p.m.? Thank you.

government (post office/various city, county, state, federal offices) - Second-worst on this list, but only because they're 90% incompetent. "Hold on, that's a different department, I'll transfer you... clicks, whirrs, clicks, ring ring (same person:) "Thank you for calling the county assessor's office, how can I help you?"

insurance - I've had pretty good luck with these folks, after car accidents and when I was sick. No complaints, at least from the phone people.

medical (hospitals/doctors) - See above. Points for asking if they can tell my wife the grizzly details if I'm not home. "Nah, let's keep her in the dark for another six months."

restaurants - your pizza will be ready in 20 minutes.

transportation (airline/bus/train) - Well, let's see if we can find a better time for you five minutes of typing, do you mind flying through Bismarck?

utilities (water/phone/electricity) - Last time I called the water department, I had a leak in my yard. There was a guy from Maine in my driveway within the hour (on a Saturday.) The gas guy showed up lickity-split too.

in my mind, land-line phone is considered a utility, while cellphone is something else. but yeah i guess phone should just be under communication, not utility. you can consider cable a utility or an "other" if you prefer

i have an old mind

I've never had cable! And my cell phone co is okay, about as good as can be expected. But historically I think that elec and gas companies really have you where they want you, because you don't rly have any other options.

yea its health insurance ftw. ppl have experience dealing w/ a parent's declining health? o its sum fun shit lemme tell ya

Xbox live.

i only asked the question because i feel like for a lot of people that i know cable/phone and in some cases cell are all bundled together, like as in "these things are ALL thru a verizon package" or some such.

I go gov't

Spends my money to enslave and kill abroad, PLUS the post office

I told Verizon I was never doing business w them again, many years ago, and I never have. :)

yeah don't get me wrong -- i personally do not have any business dealings with verizon whatsoever and i'm not the one paying for my cable or standard utilities for tax purposes, so it's just t-mobile (who i have no complaints with). verizon is a terrible company.

Same with me & AOL. Fuck those cunts xpost

My doctor's office is pretty fucking hopeless considering the scale of the organisation. They have 2 clinics and couldn't tell my wife which one she had to go to to pick up a slip of paper saying she needed a blood test. Because someone who's got TB really needs to walk to one clinic then find out she has to walk to the other clinic 2 miles away if it's the wrong one. I had to call them and in the end they actually went to the trouble of finding out which one.

I kinda feel like Departments of Motor Vehicles should have their own category.

i would imagine in any other circumstance communication & finance options would be the worst. but i've been extremely spoiled in both areas - my bank is inordinately awesome (luck of the draw, i guess) and my cell phone service is handled by work.

probably a photo finish between med & govt

it has to be insurance or government. cell phone / internet can be annoying but I've heard more horror stories than I've actually experienced.

insurance = great if it's about yr $25 co-pay, horrible if it's about yr $10,000 procedure that they are refusing to cover. or as somebody pointed out above, you're calling about an elderly loved one they'd just as soon let die to get them off their books.

government is the pits, from federal on down to city, plus the DMV. how's this for customer service?

Wait time for jobless benefits slowly dropping

07:41 AM EDT on Friday, March 13, 2009

By NEIL DOWNING

Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE — People phoning Rhode Island’s unemployment insurance call center wind up on hold for more than an hour on average before they can file claims for benefits — assuming they can get through at all.
The Rhode Island Department of Labor and Training has shaved about 18 minutes off the average wait time, which was 95 minutes last week.

But callers are still on hold for 77 minutes on average, state officials said at a House Finance Committee hearing at the State House yesterday.

77 minutes on average meaning some people are waiting even longer. shit, you better not forget any questions you were gonna ask on that call. but y'know, you're unemployed, you weren't doing anything anyway.

Real close tie between utilities (Verizon landline/cable/internet) and government (Post Office).

Ultimately went utilities. I tried to take over the payment of the bill from the last roommate who lived in the house I moved into (without changing the landline phone number). I was able to create an internet password for myself so I could pay online, but the paper bill kept being forwarded to his new address. After trying unsuccessfully for about a month to resolve the issue through customer service, we both just decided that it would be better if he kept receiving the paper bill.

^Important to realize that the actual account is still in dude's name, so there was a great deal of trust involved in that decision.

i always assumed the dmv thing was just a cliche, i've never had major problems or even particularly long waits at the dmv, either in virginia or illinois

www freelancersunion org

i havent really had to deal with most of these tbh and as much as cable co. can be dicks and its sucks to wait on hold forever ive always been able to resolve things w/comcast and rogers in the end

my only real beef is with my college whove been the most unhelpful, duplicitous and worthless jerks pretty much every time ive had to deal with them from small things like repeatedly fucking up transcript requests to "misentering" grades. and anytime i had to deal with admin ppl they acted like i was the stupidest asshole to ever waste their time with petty bs.

theyre also the worst to deal with because i always get into that whole "wtf im paying $30K to go here i deserve better treatment" mindset which is kinda dbaggy and gross so then i feel bad about getting entitled and worked up

I've had the gas co try to charge us for the year BEFORE we moved in, during which time the apt was vacant but no one thought to turn off the hot water heater. The company KNEW our move-in date but we spent about 3 mos fighting w them and having the meter read and re-read b/c they insisted we owed the whole amount and they wouldn't explain exactly what it was -- everyone we spoke to just pressured us to pay it up front. We had to actually ask for the back-charges in therms and ask my dad, an energy engineer, if it was even POSSIBLE that we had used that much gas in 2 months. He said "Hell, no! Don't pay them a cent." and so we fought.

Eventually they waived it. Gracious of them, eh? Fuckers.

oh yeah educational institutions would have been another good list option

They knew they were cheating us, and they used their position as the only natural gas provider to try to bully us into paying, with threats of disconnection and extra "re-connection" fees if we didn't comply. I even took a flashlight and made the gas co. service guy follow all the lines to make sure we weren't heating the lobby or the stairways by "accident" -- there was no possible way one little apt could use that much gas and they knew that all along.

"Insurance" should win this, but probably won't, because

a) y'all are mostly young

b) lucky non-American insurance virgins have no idea.

― M.V., Friday, March 13, 2009 10:54 AM (47 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

OTM. I voted insurance, even though I am personally blissfully unaware of what it's like to be told by an insurance company that they are very sorry, and given the number of hospice.

http://www.lacrossefootwear.com/images/en_US//local/pagespecific/gateway/customer_service_gateway2.jpg

Laurel: my local gas company still claims that I owe them money for two month of gas in a building that HAD BEEN DEMOLISHED. In order to get this off my record with them, I must produce proof that the building did not exist at the time.

I've had much better luck with insurance companies. I had one representative call me each week when I was sick just to check in with me and see how things were going. At first, I thought she was just buttering me up for some whammies down the road, but everything was cool the entire time. When I decided I wanted some elective stuff done, she was the first to say absolutely, go with it. It's on us.

Once I got a bill for something that I thought wasn't on my tab. Called them up, they checked it out, and 15 minutes later, they were telling me not to sweat it.

fuckkkk ATT

I was trying to change my service in a specific way and despite trying like 40 different paths the 'choose your own adventure' options did NOT give me any way to talk to a customer service rep.

eventually I googled it and figured out which buttons got me there, but the fact that I had to spend hours trying and eventually had to do outside fucking research just to talk to a real life human being made me pretty furious.

The post office in Chicago is notoriously bad. Something as simple as receiving your mail should not require calling and complaining. This has happened at least once at every address I've lived at here. Receiving packages? Forget it. They don't so much as leave a notice. And they will tell you bald-faced lies. Infuriating.

Ever had an insurance fucker cold call you PRETENDING THEY'RE FROM YOUR BANK so you don't hang up on their bullying arse straight away? Absolutely infuriating.

fuck em all.
ilx commune by 2012.

who will herd the goats?

The post office in Chicago is notoriously bad.

Guy at a Chicago tire shop this summer said he drives out of town to mail his bill payments.

Sunny, you should get something in writing before that guy no longer works there. o_O

Utilities is surely going to walk this in the UK? Although dealing with a Relationship Manager at a bank is pretty soul destroying too. At our local post office he have two guys behind the counter, one is the most helpful, lovely guy, puts extra tape on stuff, always smiling, checks everything, a pleasure to do business with - the other guy is super morose, surly fellow, never smiles, grunts instructions at you, throws your change at you. I try and engineer the queue so that I get smiley guym but it's tricky. nyway, long story but basically too complicated to just vote Post Office - need option for That One Guy At The Post Office.

govt because my school is a public university and i have had by far the worst experiences EVER with them and their bureaucratic bs. i would probably be tempted to say insurance, but lol i'm uninsured!

haha laurel, i heard amex wanted to pay some people to just walk away and not charge anything more, so this doesn't surprise me!
xpost

also my phone co has always been really fine!!! way better than verizon, who i wanted to murder regularly.

Fortunately haven't had to deal with health insurance issues - I don't doubt they're awful.

Government - wins hands down - no competition to encourage better service (except perhaps the Post Office). I'm biased though, because I spent last year dealing with building and fire code crap for an arts space I run, and that was probably the worst experience w/government officials. You end up in a time-wasting loop where the building department and fire department refer you to the other one, and nothing happens without spending large quantities of money. Plus, included in this category would be the Court system and police departments. The California DMV is awful.

bureaucracy itself isn't bad -- it just particularly sucks when a lot of it is put in place specifically to discourage people from pursuing the benefits they're entitled to get.

i spent so long going back and forth btw bursar and financial aid last spring that i didn't get my loan check until MID MAY!!!!

it's like they want to make it hard for you to be in debt to them!

communication (cell phone/internet)
finance (bank/credit card)
government (post office/various city, county, state, federal offices)
insurance
medical (hospitals/doctors)

^^ this is like a summary of all the bills, documents, forms, etc. that are piled up on my dresser that i've been putting off for many months. just seeing this list gives me shudders.

Kenan, I forgot about the demo'ed apartment!! That kind of does take the cake. Didn't they have to disconnect and/or CAP the gas lines before it could be demolished?? Obviously they did or there'd have been a massive explosion at some point for sure, so that's ridiculous.

my only real beef is with my college whove been the most unhelpful, duplicitous and worthless jerks pretty much every time ive had to deal with them from small things like repeatedly fucking up transcript requests to "misentering" grades. and anytime i had to deal with admin ppl they acted like i was the stupidest asshole to ever waste their time with petty bs.

this is on some real shit, h8 dealing w. the registrars office

like i'm not late on any bills necessarily, it's just a pile of forms that i know i need to look through and organize

Didn't they have to disconnect and/or CAP the gas lines before it could be demolished?? Obviously they did or there'd have been a massive explosion at some point for sure, so that's ridiculous.

I know, right? What, was there a hissing hole in the ground there that they're trying to charge me for?

verizon was a total nightmare when i set up my DSL. but they were good with my cellphone.

xpost I think I'm most annoyed at them putting the burden of proof on ME. "We need documentation to show that building was torn down." What? You're a fucking utility company, look it up!

On the other hand, my recent experience with online yahoo customer service was so ridiculous to be laughable.

Me: I'm not getting confirmation emails from paypal. They don't go in a junk folder or bulk folder, they don't show up, period. Paypal says the messages have been sent. I'm getting all other email. Could the emails be blocked somehow?
Yahoo: boilerplate tech support paragraphs telling me that there is no problem with their e-mail servers, perhaps the messages got put in your junk folder? Have the domain administrator contact us.
Me: As I said, the emails don't go in my junk folder, they don't arrive. It's paypal. It isn't some random small website.
Yahoo: repeats the same boilerplate as above.
Me: Are you even reading what I'm saying? It appears that the emails are being blocked somehow, such that they don't arrive in my account.
Yahoo: repeats the same boilerplate as above, adds paragraphs about why sometimes email isn't delivered due to high traffic and glitches, suggests about a page down that it's unlikely, but perhaps the sender has been blocked and tells me where to look to see if the sender is a blocked address.

LAMBETH COUNCIL.

I mean, you really don't have a choice there. You can't just up and decide that you're going to get your services from a different council, can you?

I feel like BT should pretty much be bestriding the UK side of this argument like a gigantic multilimbed incompetent monster

My legal name and my professional name are different, but close enough (same first initial, same last name, etc). I can't count the times the mailman refused to deliver me a package (cause he's super lazy), and I had to go to the Post Office to pick it up... and they wouldn't give it to me because my ID and the name on the package were different.

"You have to tell Mordechai to come pick this up, sir."
"THAT IS ME."
"The person who has this name will have to come pick this up."
"THERE IS NO ONE WITH THAT NAME IN THIS WORLD. THAT PERSON DOES NOT EXIST. IT IS ME."
"Sorry, I cannot give you this package."

^^ We had a similar issue with a bank at work before I worked there, but my boss likes telling this story. The name on the account was the name of the organization: [boss' name] Ensemble. My boss calls the bank and tells them his name. The bank refuses to discuss the matter with him, because he is not "Mr. Ensemble."

sl

Yeah, but there are *alternatives* to BT. I haven't dealt with them in about 7 years. You cannot choose an alternate Council Service provider.

Laurel I have the original agreement in writing and receipts of the deposits. I know I should make the effort to track down the original guy but this is all happening with an australian account so motivation to fix the prob is at about nil right now.

bunches of xposts, of course

computer.. hmm. maybe. phone company? yes very much so. but the custom office hs been HORRIBLE: they kept a package for THREE MONTHS!!!!! They wouldn't pick up the fucking phone. I emailed them again and again. finallu they sent it. AFTER THREE FUCKING MONTHS.

transportation companies, because they can easily hold your actual physical person prisoner in terrifying bureaucratic kafka styleee (eg sitting in plane on runway for hours, or in an airport terminal in a strange land)

http://www.michaeltotten.com/archives/2009/03/the-worst-airli.php

I've got my credit card and cell phone through Working Assets, and they have the most pleasant, amiable customer service reps I've ever talked to. On the few occasions me or my boyfriend have had to call about something, we've always gotten off the phone saying, "They're so nice! I don't mind calling them at all!"

My boyfriend would like to add that he also likes dealing with the IRS because they always have their shit together.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

"General retail" probably deserves at least one vote so I'm giving it mine. It got dismissed above as "what time do you close?" but that might be from thinking in terms of phone calls? In-person retail stonewalling is the worst of any of these for these reasons:

1) you're in person, not on the phone, so you're probably standing up, thought you would be eating lunch by now, otherwise have had your day - out in the world - dragged out by this unexpectedly tedious waste of time
2) the big one: THEY HAVE TO CONTINUOUSLY PRETEND THEY'RE BEING NICE TO YOU. The government people can just be straight up assholes and talk to you like you're a combination four-year-old criminal mastermind. Retail are on these nicey-nice scripts that increase the sheer amount of verbiage tremendously (dragging things on even LONGER) while also grating on you with kindergarten-teacher sweetness which is trying to make you feel guilty for even bothering this nice corporation about how they overcharged you, aren't accepting a return, whatever. Retail people are by no means as uniformly unpleasant as some of these others but when they are bad they are horrid.

The real enemy though is none of these categories, but the replacement of customer service people AT ALL with voice-detecting robots. I was on a phone loop with UPS the other day where there was no option, ever, to get to an operator, and of course none of the options they give correspond to the more unlikely, out-of-the-box thing I need to do. It turns out that if you do start yelling "I want to talk to a person! PER-SON! HU-MAN! BE-ING!" it'll trip some anger-detection switch and finally go "please hold while I connect you with a customer service specialist" and then they can finally help you.

My legal name and my professional name are different, but close enough (same first initial, same last name, etc). I can't count the times the mailman refused to deliver me a package (cause he's super lazy), and I had to go to the Post Office to pick it up... and they wouldn't give it to me because my ID and the name on the package were different.

They once refused to give a package to my husband even though I had signed the paper. They claimed it wasn't my signature. When I went and showed my id, they reluctantly gave it.

My boyfriend would like to add that he also likes dealing with the IRS because they always have their shit together.

My only (admittedly quite limited) experience with government tax people in the UK has been positive, very helpful and on most occasions have got money back (which might be influencing my judgement).

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

The thing about utilities is that dealing with them is so crappy because in most cases you really don't know what you're talking about, so it's hard to know when exactly to use your srs business voice - okay it doesn't help that they make the whole process so opaque but like maybe I really did use an extra 80 pounds worth of electrity this month! Who knows? Sometime I leave lightswitches on!

The interesting thing as Dr Cas pointed out is people are mostly focussing on over-the-phone interactions. But if you broaden it, then for my money fucking doctors are up there for in-person patronising uselessness. Also, rail/public transport staff (bus drivers, ticket staff at stations etc). Usless to a man.

My current cable/internet/phone company was also my C-band satellite programming company back in the early 90s, and I do believe they may have the best telephone customer service I've ever dealt with. Polite, knowledgeable and smart. It's a regional company, though, so recommendations would be pointless.

At the other extreme: Blue Cross anywhere.

this is really one of those 'everyone's a winner' things

yeah xp otm i didn't vote but sometimes i feel alone in thinking doctors and their helpers are the worst. esp nurses who talk to you like you're a child. maybe my impression is tainted by the horribleness of HMOs and dumb receptionists though.

on the other hand bus drivers in my experience are the best!

My legal name and my professional name are different, but close enough (same first initial, same last name, etc). I can't count the times the mailman refused to deliver me a package (cause he's super lazy), and I had to go to the Post Office to pick it up... and they wouldn't give it to me because my ID and the name on the package were different.

It seems like they're just trying to protect the customer's package. I probably would not have given you the package if you showed up with a different ID than name on the package.

maybe I really did use an extra 80 pounds worth of electrity this month! Who knows? Sometime I leave lightswitches on!

Oh, Greg. :D

"Insurance" should win this, but probably won't, because

a) y'all are mostly young

b) lucky non-American insurance virgins have no idea.

― M.V., Friday, March 13, 2009 10:54 AM (4 days ago)

this is SO otm

fuck all these companies

I just had an insanely positive customer service experience with my insurance company yesterday. I called fully intending to be in tears and out a whole lot of money within ten minutes, and instead, the nice lady solved my problem without giving me any grief, thus saving me over $2k. I'm still in shock.

your health insurance company?

Yes!!!! I mean, the whole problem was that they denied a claim because they did not receive documentation that, it turns out, they never asked for, but still. The lady on the phone was very nice and competent.

This is actually probably more about my dismally low expectations than about my health insurance provider being in any way good.

No way dude, you must have good insurance (maybe not the company so much as the coverage). I get nothing but bills from mine, and they didn't cover a routine checkup so I was out $600.

We've talked about this on the Chicago thread, but yeah, it's really good coverage.

fuck all these companies

― congratulations (n/a), Thursday, April 29, 2010 10:53 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

though i had a pretty positive experience getting answers to questions about my internet service using at&t's online chat last week.

think i'd still vote airlines because it's shitty customer service on top of the stress of flying and traveling

my pick of "airlines" looking very prescient today