Eric bought tickets for a special event at a theme park a month in advance. Well, more like 30 days. He purchased it for the wrong day, but figured a simple call to customer service would get him new tickets for the correct date. He was wrong. A complaint on their Facebook page didn’t help, either. What next?

He tried something new: writing to a few of the park’s bosses. This is a classic technique that we call an executive e-mail carpet bomb, and he used our 6-year-old template to do it.

He sent us the following thank-you note (always a nice touch):

I purchased tickets for a special event at a local theme park. After I completed my purchase I realized that I selected the wrong date. I wanted to go on a Saturday, I accidentally purchased a ticket for Friday. I assumed that a quick call to customer service as soon as they were open the next day would resolve my mistake.

I called that next day and was told to purchase another ticket for the correct day, then on the day I visit the park (a month later.) I could visit the guest relations window inside the park and I could then talk to them about refunding the unused ticket.

I posted a comment to their facebook page, which was promptly deleted by their admin. I sent an e-mail to their customer service department, the response I got back from them was I should have been paying attention to the date that I selected and that there were no refunds, which they bolded for emphasis.

I called customer service one last time hoping I would get someone that could help. The lead that I spoke with informed me that because I had confirmed the date on-line when I purchased the tickets there was nothing that could be done for me.

Shortly after that call, I looked up the park president of operations and other executives that I felt might be able to help me. I figured out the e-mail schema based on my interaction with the customer service email box.

I composed as brief an e-mail as I could focused on the problems I had and what I wanted and launched it.

I am happy to report that thanks to the tutorial you posted, the park contacted me, apologized for the font line employees unwillingness to help me and resolved my issue immediately.

Thank you again for empowering me as a consumer!

While we generally recommend careful reading of the rules in order to avoid mistakes like this, it’s nice to hear that all Eric had to do was ask the right person nicely in order to get his refund. We’re glad that we were here for you!

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