"An AOL representative declined to say whether the manual was legitimate or comment on the matter."

We know it's cross-eyed and with facial features askew, but gawd, that's sooo cold. How could they disown their offspring so out of hand?That manual is going to have difficulty with commitment when it grows up.

"AOL Customer Service Manual Posted To Web?" [Cnet]

Read our critique of the contents here.

Thank you, disaffected former AOL retainer.

After the jump, a few select preview pages...

A shot from the flowchart.

Related:

• AOL Retention Manual Revealed
• AOL Employees Slander Vincent Ferrari On Company Time
• BREAKING: Spitzer To Talk To AOL, Again
• AOL Updates Retention "Offer Matrix"
• AOL Internal Memos, After Vinny's Call
• We Interview Vincent Ferrari, AOL Canceller
• Dead Defeat AOL
• AOL Canceler on Today Show
• AOL Wants to Sell "Internet" to the Dead
• Consumerist on CNBC
• AOL Apologizes For Infamous Cancel Call
• The Best Thing We Have Ever Posted: Reader Tries To Cancel AOL
• AOL Officially Sucks More Than Anything Else

I used to work for AOL doing 'retention'..."

Come closer, my child.

In her letter, Tari, confirms the manual is bonafide. Also, according to her, most retention specialists would much rather skip over all the "discovery" and "rapport building" and get straight to the part where they give you a discount so you won't leave. But having spent all this time writing such an exhaustive manual, AOL gets a bit miffed (read: fires your ass) if you don't follow their elaborately constructed retention rubric.

And like most operations of its ilk, they show you its dark side inch by inch until one day you wake up with blood on your hands, a black cloak on the nightstand and no memory of how the sacrificed babies got in the bed, to wit, "i worked for a call centre contracted to do the retention and wasn't told that it was a sales job when i was hired..."

"greetings:

i used to work for AOL doing 'retention' and also for MSN doing the same thing.

to be more accurate, i worked for a call centre contracted to do the retention and wasn't told that it was a sales job when i was hired. it was hilarious when the call centre, which was doing AOL stuff won the MSN contract. they BUILT A WALL to keep staff separate. anyway, almost all retention is contracted out, but AOL execs visit and listen to calls remotely and provide strict guidance. the sales pitches and manuals are written by AOL and also, the call centre trainers are trained by AOL. these AOL marketing people are really stupid and have very fixed minds and don't want to listen to feedback from the people who actually take the calls.

anyway, i can verify that manual you mention is 100% accurate. they even make 11x17 inch cardboard ORANGE and PURPLE posters which are posted in the cubicles. punishment is swift and severe for those who don't follow the 6 steps, up to and including termination. most of the staff wants to immediately cancel memberships, but they are harassed and abused by supervisors when they do. it's called 'counselling' and you only get a few chances to stop 'screwing up' before you're out the door.

there is also another method for keeping lots of customers that can work to the advantage of the company and to the member. everyone is happy, it goes like this: what a lot of the workers want to do is skip over all the crap and get right to the 'right offer' which is where you offer them free months, as many as three, and a reduction in monthly fees. many people who call do so because U$23.90 is too much for them. when they tell you it is too much, why put them thru hell, is the thought of lots of the staff, why not just say, "if you're willing to stay for x months, i can lower your monthly fee to x"? so what happens is that they gamble that they are not being listened to and just make the offer. and almost always, it is accepted, and the customer is pleased, both at getting free stuff, paying less and not getting hassled. plus time is not wasted, and company gets to keep a customer. but that's not allowed.

lots of people who do want to cancel for other reasons and who come in hostile can actually be won over and got to stay just by skipping the really stupid steps and offering a free month or two and lowering the price for them. and if this is the case, why put them through tons of stupid stuff? the staff know this but AOL execs don't want to listen. all the steps can be skipped just by saying: something along the lines of, "i see by your records that you've been with AOL for a long time. as you know, it's great for doing research whether for work or school, and we're really kid-friendly. we have virus protection built-in now and we're adding new features all the time, like legal music and movie downloading. if you'd be willing to stay with us, what i can do for you is give you a x months free and see what i can do about getting you a lower monthly fee." no rigmarole, just straightforward info and a decent offer.

but NO, that's not what AOL's execs want and the call centre managers know it is a crock too, but they go along so they can keep the contract.

[snip]

it's too bad i just tossed all my printed materials for AOL and MSN or i'd mail them to you so you could get a nice good laugh.

kind regards,
Tari"

A plain manila envelope arrived on our desk this week. Inside was the eighty-one paged "Enhanced Sales Training for AOL Retention Consultants" manual. Upon opening, the flowchart, "Guide to a World-Class Retention Call," fell out.

It's amazing that the story has come this far, that Vincent could record his attempt to cancel AOL, that recording would shoot to national TV, and now, a mole has sent us incriminating company documents.

One thing quickly becomes evident after reading the pages of tips and tactics. Callers are viewed not as customers, but prospects. Under the heading, "Think of Cancellation Calls as Sales Leads," the manual reads...

If you stop and think about it, every Member that calls in to cancel their account is a hot lead. Most other sales jobs require you to create your own leads, but in the Retention Queue the leads come to you! Be eager to take more calls, get more leads and close more sales. More leads means more selling opportunities for you and cost savings for AOL.

In a public statement, AOL's Nicholas Graham claimed that John, "violated our customer service guidelines and practices, and everything that AOL believes to be important in customer care - chief among them being respect for the member, and swiftly honoring their requests." If this is true, then why is there such a complex system designed to thwart those very requests? Brevity thrives on simplicity.

To reel you back in, AOL has a six stage system:

1. Greet and Verify
2. Discovery
3. Tailored Value
4. Right Offer
5. Resolve Concerns
6. Motivate to Activate

In Vincent's call, John never got past step 2. He got stuck in "Discovery" where he used "digging" to try to get more information about Vincent. John's goal was to use this intel to build an argument for staying with AOL, and deliver what the manual calls the "tailored value." A bit of an ill-fitting suit, if there ever was one, since in his inquest, John never found out that Vincent was an IT professional.

Digging involves asking the lead questions that build a portrait of the prospect's wants, interests and needs. AOL cheerfully terms these, "WINS." From page 4-20 of the "Best Practices" section:

With respect to Vincent's computer expertise, John's attempts at digging play like a study in comedy.

VINCENT: I don't need it, I don't want it, I don't use it.
JOHN: So when you use this, is that for business or school?
VINCENT: I don't want the AOL account, can we please just cancel it?
JOHN: On June 2nd, I see 72 hours of usage...

Some sales cannot be made. There is a certain point after which you're just wasting your time. Past that, you risk enraging the customer. Then there's the point where the customer tapes the conversation and humiliates you in the national media.

"This call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes," goes both ways.

John had access to a program, "Merlin," apparently so-called for its ability to turn piss into champagne. If Vincent was more pliable, John could have used it. By clicking various responses a lead makes, the behavior matrix suggests phrases for the salesperson to utter and guide customers back to AOL's fetid bosom.

The soul of Merlin is the Member Profile Guide. It boasts four tabs, "Know," "Listen," "Feel," and "How you want them to feel." Apparently, "Manipulate" was too blunt. Each tab provides different stratagems tailored to the specific customer on the line. For instance, the "Know" tab, "identifies the Member attribute and the 'role' we should play for the member." For example, if a new member has a low amount of usage, Merlin suggests taking on the guise of a "helpful guide."

Alternatively, selecting the Feel tab gives users, "an idea of the emotions the member might be feeling and how we might appropriately respond to those feelings...in bullet point form."

The manual is full of more creepy delights, including:

• On "overcoming objections" i.e. customer's desire to not connect to watered-down version of the internet, the manual advises to, "allow your callers to talk comfortably about their concerns." By doing this you can literally, "watch their concerns and resistance drop."

• As we all know and love, the best way to "keep it real" is corporate policy mandating naturalness. That's why AOL developed, "Keep It Real"...a set of principles that will drive a world-class Member experience..."

• Then there's also this doozy from black-is-white land: "The reason that many Members are going to high speed is, because the actual internet connection is much more stable....we now have the perfect solution...a free modem." Ah yes, the hot-rodding superpower of 24kbps.

• Jason Watkins, an AOL Customer Care Consultant quoted in the manual says it best, "Consumers believe everything is a commodity, i.e. where can I buy the service for the least cost. My objective as a salesperson is to prove otherwise."

An AOL retention consultant's job is to trick consumers into being stupid.

It's hard to keep track of the array of tools at their AOL call center employee's disposal. There's "Member Connect," "The Discovery Wheel," "eSource," "ASQ," "CSS," "FBB's," "WINs," and "Drill Down Questions." Operators get advice and coaching from their team leaders and fellow employees. With over 160,000 calls a day, the sales force continually hones its craft.

To AOL's credit, John seems to have missed the section that advised to, "Never get angry with the Member...Don't criticize the Member by saying things like "you don't have to be so difficult with me" or "you're impossible to deal with." Maybe that's because most of the manual is devoted to overcoming customer's objections and selling them on AOL's awesomeness.

"Traditionally, when companies have profitable but shrinking businesses, like AOL's access service, they try to milk as much money as they can from them without investing new cash.," reported the New York Times on July 10th. The article hinged around CEO John Miller's proposal in two weeks time before his Time Warner overlords for a bold revamp of AOL's services. Included in the proposition are said to be plans to eliminate retention consultants entirely.

Instead of investing in a system that people actually wanted to use, AOL created a system for duping customers into not exercising their right to leave for cheaper, higher-quality services. Behind the rhetoric of "Member Services" and "World Class Value" are suits that see their members as spreadsheet numbers. The suits sleep soundly as long as one column is kept high and the other low.

UPDATE: Full copy of the AOL manual here.

Readers, please Digg this story.

• AOL Employees Slander Vincent Ferrari On Company Time
• BREAKING: Spitzer To Talk To AOL, Again
• AOL Updates Retention "Offer Matrix"
• AOL Internal Memos, After Vinny's Call
• We Interview Vincent Ferrari, AOL Canceller
• Dead Defeat AOL
• AOL Canceler on Today Show
• AOL Wants to Sell "Internet" to the Dead
• Consumerist on CNBC
• AOL Apologizes For Infamous Cancel Call
• The Best Thing We Have Ever Posted: Reader Tries To Cancel AOL
• AOL Officially Sucks More Than Anything Else

One of the more incredible results of the Vincent Ferrari AOL Cancellation fiasco is the outpouring of support. Oh, not for Vincent! For AOL.

It seems like every binder-quoting customer retention monkey has taken to the Internet to start flinging feces at Vincent and rah-rahing AOL. We covered a few of these guys on Friday.

But one AOL Customer Retention Expert was so incensed by the exposure of Vincent's ordeal that he wrote a blog post to unofficially comment on the fiasco. Some of it will be pretty clearly called into question when Ben posts his expose of the AOL Customer Retention Manual.

But one thing our anonymous AOL Customer Retention Expert claims is that the AOL rumor is that Vincent called over 170 times to get a CSR as nasty as John. In other words, he was fishing for a fiasco.

What sort of Electric Kool Aid AOL Test do you need to be on to believe that? It just stretches plausibility wafer thin: Vincent Ferrari called 170 times in a row, tried to cancel, then when he was able to cancel easily and efficiently, resubscribed, hung up and redialed.

Now that AOL is looking to go entirely free, are these guys really so desperate to keep their jobs that they have to mount an internet campaign to disprove Vincent's recording? And isn't there a single guy working for AOL who can come up with something less idiotic than unproven mumblings of a Ferrari-led conspiracy?

AOL Unofficial Clarification of Policies

Contrast this with Nicholas Graham's assertion that cancellation requests are processed quickly...

When I tried to cancel my account, I had the following runaround with "Amy." My favorite part is her exasperated, "All right then!" I should note that I am still receiving correspondence from J2 as if I were a customer, although I am not incurring any charges.

Read more after this jumparoony...

{Amy R.} Hello, Chris. Welcome to j2 Global online support. I am Amy, your online live Support Representative. How may I assist you?

{Chris} Hi Amy - I would like to cancel my account, please.

{Amy R.} I am sorry to hear that you wish to cancel. Could you please provide me your fax number as well as the PIN for verification purposes?

{Chris} # is xxxxxxxxxx

{Chris}PIN is xxxx

{Amy R.}Thank you for the information. Please give me a moment while I quickly check your account in our records. In the meanwhile, may I ask why you are canceling your fax account? Is it some aspect of the service, which you are not familiar with, or is there any problem with the service? If so, we could help you with the same.

{Chris} I used the service for a project which is now completed. However, as an aside, I wasn't completely satisfied with the service as there were several occasions when we tried to have a conference call and the service was unavailable (both web & by phone).

{Amy R.}I sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused to you.

{Amy R.} Chris, I can understand that you have a limited usage of the service for the time being however, in the current situation as a special consideration, we will waive off the monthly fee for two months. You can use the fax service without paying any monthly fees for the next two billing cycles. Please feel free to contact us at any time. This way you will be able to keep your local fax number, which will enable you to send and receive any pending faxes with your number. You never know when the need arises.

{Amy R.} Your jConnect Premier account will be credited with $30.00 so that you may utilize our services without being billed our monthly fee for the next two billing cycles.

{Amy R.} Since you will not be charged any monthly fees for the next two months you may keep the account till then. If at all you find that you need our services during this period, then you will still have the account. If however, you still feel that you do not have any use for our services by the end of the two months credit period, then you can always contact us back anytime.

{Chris} I'm sorry - I would like you cancel the account right now. I will not have any further need for the service.

{Amy R.} Chris, I can completely understand your wish to discontinue, since you have already paid for the month, I suggest you to retain this number at least till the end of two months credit offer as you will not be charged any monthly fee for the two months. As a goodwill gesture for our further association, I would also provide you with an additional gift balance of $10.00 with which you can send up to 100 pages of faxes for free (per page per minute within US & Canada) along with the monthly credit.

{Amy R.} After the completion of 2 months credit period, if you feel that the fax number does not serve your purpose, you can get back to us immediately without any further obligation to stay back.

{Amy R.} We are available 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. Please feel free to contact us at any time.

{Amy R.} Just for the sake of your concern, we will crediting your jConnect Premier account with $30.00 and $10.00 as gift balance for the next two months for which you will not be charged any monthly fees.

{Chris} Amy - please cancel my account. I appreciate the offer, but as I mentioned, I will have no further need for the service, so I am not interested in even having the option.

{Amy R.} All right then! I will cancel your number immediately. This is the affirmative confirmation that your account has just been cancelled and all your account information has automatically been deleted by our system.

{Amy R.} I'm sorry that you are leaving eFax. At eFax, we are continuously improving our products and services. Please do consider us if your faxing needs should change in the future.

{Amy R.}Thank you for contacting j2 Global Online Support, I hope you found our session helpful.

"I was sitting next to one of my clients this morning and told her about Consumerist.com, as it was up on my screen. She said "Oh, I've got one for you." Her father passed away recently, and she had to cancel or close all of his various accounts. When she called to cancel his AOL account, they asked her why she was cancelling the account. "It was my father's account, and he died." "Is that the only reason?" was their reply. She was dumbfounded. They did cancel the account, incidentally.

I do some work for a company that's also very aggressive in customer retention (i.e. try to get you to NOT cancel) and I've reviewed their call center scripts, and when "reason" = "death," they cancel immediately without trying to save the account. I'd love to see AOL's scripts or their CSR training materials."

Even more offensive is the CSR asking a yes or no question. Every low-level shoe sales associate knows to leave questions open-ended, especially when overcoming objections. "I wouldn't be caught dead in these pumps" should be met with, "Which sort of deaths might being caught in these pumps be beneficial?" Now that's salesmanship, Johnny.