Consumerist
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heroes
Man Tells Fax Spammers To Go Fax Themselves... And They Comply
Pat is our consumer action hero of the week. He writes:
For weeks now I have been receiving fax calls on my house line, a number I've had for over twenty years and now ported to VOIP; somehow, at some point, it got included on a telemarketing fax CD.
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complaint letters
Professional Complaint Letter Writer Shares His Secrets
"Praise with faint damn" is the underlying secret to how professional complaint letter writer Bruce Silverman is able to be so successful in getting companies to give him free stuff. First class upgrades, Room upgrades with views of frolicking whales, Checks for hundreds of dollars... all these and more are the fruits of Bruce's calculated typewriter clacking. Now Bruce has come out with a small book with a big promise: to teach you How To Complaint For Fun And Profit. Here's a chapter from it, exclusively on The Consumerist, detailing how he was able to turn a disappointing experience at the Ritz-Carlton in Hawaii into a long-term stream of room upgrades, comped meals, and decidedly above and beyond customer service... More » -
features
Interview With Ron Burley, Customer Service Avenger
"There's only one leverage any consumer has with a company. And that's financial." So says Ron Burley, author of UNSCREWED: The Consumer's Guide To Getting What You Paid For. I got to interview Ron Burley to plumb his brain about his customer satisfaction hacks, and the current state of affairs of customer service. His techniques are bold and make no apologies. We're not talking letters, and forms, and complaint departments. These are real methods for real people that work real fast. He also goes into the mindset that you need to develop if you're going to get results. Bookmark this post, it's an epic barnburner. Transcript, inside...
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12:00 PM on Wed Mar 12 2008
By Ben Popken
13,790 views, 40 commentsLatest by Cliff_Donner: OK, I have not read this book, only this blog and its accompanying posts. Burley's advice does not seem more »
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readers
Mind F*ck Used To Get Debt Collector To Stop Calling Wrong Number
A reader tells us how he got a debt collector who kept calling looking for someone else to stop calling, by turning the privacy invasion tables on him and freaking him out.
"Washington Mutual kept calling my phone for the past 3 weeks, about 10 times a day and I usually just hang up. But this time I made the person identify himself, where he was at..." More »
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small claims court
Suing Big Companies In Small Claims Court Is Fun And Easy
Taking a big company to small claims court sounds like a big hassle but reader Bill has done it successfully three times. He says the time and effort spent on taking a company to small claims court is far less then how it long it takes to get companies to fix above-average in complexity problems.
Here's his typical expenditure for a small claims suit: $24 and 45 minutes. The $24 is the cost to file a claim. The 45 minutes includes his total time of driving to and from court to file, as well as the time spent on the phone with the company when they call to settle.
See, in all cases, he hasn't even had to go to court: the company calls him up the day before the court date and gives him a settlement. It seems they prefer to do that then pay to fly a company representative who isn't fully versed on all the facts to court. Here's his true story of how he got what he deserved from Tmobile and Washington Mutual, without breaking a sweat. More »
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how to
What To Say When You Call The CEO's Office
This classic article on the art of "turboing," escalating your problem to the executive's office, has some great advice about what to say when you get there. Here's a line Rob Levandowski, himself a former Tier 2 XEROX customer service rep, uses to get his foot in the door once he reaches the CEO's secretary:
"Hello, my name is ________. I'm one of your customers, and I was hoping to speak to (CEO's name) because I'm really getting frustrated with getting a problem resolved, and I know that your company doesn't want me to feel that way."
Rob says this works because if they don't help you, they're backed into a corner of seeming like they actually do want you angry and frustrated. And despite what articles on this site might otherwise suggest, most people like to go bed at night feeling like they're good people. The rest of the article is a really great refresher course on how to win when calling executive customer service.
The Art of Turboing [Macwhiz]
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success stories
Seagate Issue Resolved After Posting Complaint Along With Executive Email Addresses On Company's Own Site
Shawn has a nice success story with the Seagate company that provides an interesting twist on the EECB (Executive Email Carpet Bomb) technique that we've been telling you about for months:I bought a Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB external harddrive about two or three months ago, and backed up several harddrives to it. Everything was going awesome on every computer I had, but then it had an issue on my desktop. "Delayed Write Failure" WHAT? I try to read the information on the drive, it won't allow me.
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hardballs
How To Mind Control Customer Service Reps
Reader Lona says that people in her family have called her a consumer advocate since she was sixteen, and now she is going to share with us 2,177 words on the customer service tactics and techniques she uses to get satisfaction. She writes, "in 99% of situations, it allows you to reach an agreeable solution to almost any problem. It is something I do for family and friends, and for myself." Some of her methods have been mentioned in various ways on the site before but others are completely unique. And by the time you read her true success story at the end, you'll swear she has Jedi mind-control over customer service reps. It boils down to, without raising your voice, asserting control over the conversation from the beginning and then never relinquishing that power. More » -
hardballs
Question Customer Service Authority
The advice for high-powered business travelers trying to get through travel emergencies offered in the New York Times article, "When It's Time to Call the Cavalry," can apply to anyone trying to get out of a customer service bind. In it, Paul Tucci, author of "Traveling Everywhere: How to Survive a Global Business Trip," says:
"Normally travelers will take whatever someone says. Challenge it. I'll say, 'I know how airports work and I know where the bag is.'" Mr. Tucci advises being kind and polite but assertive. "When it's an emergency, I don't obey the rules. I'll go to the front of the queue. Do what you need to do."
Question. Insist. No is not an answer. Get what you want by being clear, direct, calm and in control.
When It's Time to Call the Cavalry [NYT]
(Photo: de jäck Mamsäll) -
hardballs
Consumer's Revenge Against Restaurant Not Honoring Coupons
Alan writes:
Three co-workers and I went out to lunch. We brought a coupon that said, "Buy one entree, and receive 50% off a second entree of equal or lower price." Three of us ordered food from the Entree section of the menu, but one of us ordered something from the [cheap] Sandwich section.
When the bill came, they had given us the sandwich for half price. I complained to the waiter, pointing out that the sandwich was not an entree. He did not budge. I asked to speak to the manager. After a while, the waiter returned and said he had spoken to the manager, who also refused to honor the coupon. He said that the 50% was off the
cheapest meal on the menu, whether it was an entree or not.For the next week, I scrounged up about 10 of the same coupons...
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hardballs
New York, 2:04 AM
Wed Dec 3
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