Customer Support That Works

[anujit 0]

A long story. So sit back and listen.

On Tuesday (for the week of 13th Nov '05) I got a SMS at 4 PM saying that I should pay my outstanding dues immediately or my services will be disconnected. I have got such notices from RIM when they started operations and didn't have a clue of what was going on. Of course I had never defaulted on a payment. So I ignored the message as usual and went about life.

At 6 PM I got a second SMS saying my outgoing calls had been deactivated. I checked and it really was. Now this made me pretty pretty pretty damn furious! I am a good customer for RIM. I get very large bills and I pay them on time every time. Plus I have been with RIM forever and who the hell were they to disconnect my service!

So I called up CC and they told me it was because a credit card payment of mine had been rejected they had disconnected and advised me to make a payment (value of which was my bill due for the month of Oct - the bill and they last date for payment for which had not arrived yet)!

Now there’s extreme stupidity, then there’s George Bush, and finally RIM customer care. Admittedly it has improved and handles most activation/plan change/billing queries related info better. But for special cases and special customers - I am apparently a Platinum Customer, which is the best type of customer for RIM - they should have someone more competent to deal with the situation. They did not and continued reciting stupid things like parrots. This made me even more furious.

Now a flashback - what lead to the problem.

I had paid my bill for Aug '05 online by credit card twice. Reason being, the first time I paid it I got a "transaction failed" error. The second time the payment went through. Now 5 days later I saw only 1 payment acknowledged on RIM's site but my online banking account should 2 payments made from my credit card.

So I first called RIM and confirmed they had received only 1 payment. Then I called my bank and told them to cancel the 2nd payment. Where had the money gone I wondered!

My bill Sept '05 came and they asked me to pay the balance amount (Sept bill - Aug Bill double payment). But since I had cancelled the 2nd payment I paid RIM in full for Sept 05.

One month later RIM finally realised that the 2nd payment for Aug 05 had been rejected by my bank. This was an excess amount over and above my bill so it isn’t like I owed them money. But they still felt the need to disconnect my phone with a 2 hour notice period.

I, of course, am a very through person. I had captured screen shots of my problem and stored them in my Gmail account. A quick search through my 8-10,000 mails helped me retrieve the screenshots in 0.012 of a second!

That night I found out the names and email addresses of 3 of RIM's head honchos and really lambasted them for disconnecting my service (the screenshots were included in my mail). Oh and I had also send the same mail to the Chairman’s Office too.

By, 10 AM next morning (Wednesday) I had received apologies from all 3 head honchos. In their mail they had all referred my problem as top priority to very senior CC people and asked me to contact them again if my problem was not resolved in 48 hours.

In reply to my same mail Chairman’s Office sent me a reply - “We tried contacting you but were unable to reach you. Please give us your phone number, customer account number, and details of your problem…..”. Freaking idiots. My outgoing had been discontinued. I had sent them a very threatening 4 page mail. And this is their reply. In-phuckin-credible I say.

Anyway, by 12 noon Wednesday, all my services were restored and things worked great. At 1 PM a guy from the Chairman’s Office calls and says that he had been forwarded the complaint by one of his seniors and he wanted to inform me that my services had been restored but I should pay the Aug 05 bill amount again immediately. (Banging my head against the wall)! I told him I would not and he could try disconnecting my services again. He replied he would forward my problem to the billing department. (wonder which department was handling the problem before – maybe the gardening staff was)!

That evening (Wednesday) I got a call from the head of RIM’s Post Paid Customer Care. He was of course much more courteous in his behaviour and he assured me that my problem was taken care of and asked my opinion of their services etc. A good PR effort and well appreciated too! Which is what Chairman’s Office should have done before disconnecting me in the first place.

On, Wednesday evening I got a mail from the Chairman’s Office again saying that I had to pay Rs. XXXX otherwise I would not have my services restored (they already had been restored that afternoon). XXX = my bill due for the month of Oct - the bill and the last date for payment for which had not arrived yet!

I forwarded the mail to the Head of RIM’s Post Paid CC on Thursday and asked him to explain why on earth I got such a mail. After all, if he was personally looking into the matter I should not have to deal with this kind of mail. Soon I got a call from what seemed to be a slightly smarter CC person who said that I do not have to pay anything now and should just pay my Oct 05 bill by the due date.

Today morning (Friday) I got a call from the same person again checking to see if everything was working fine and assured me to just pay my bills by the due date and not worry about this problem it had been resolved.

In the evening I got another call this time from the head of Customer Care (Maharashtra & Goa) who was enquiring to see if my problems had been solved. He gave me his mobile number and everything and asked me to get in touch with him for all my problems. That’s good PR I think. I thanked him for his help.

Of course I’m in the process of mailing my thanks to the 3 head honchos I had first mailed as well.

But the lesson to be learnt here is that if you talk in the right way to the right people you can get things done even with RIM! So the people who keep b*i*t*c*h*i*n about unresolved problems - there is hope!

[StaticElectricity 8]

wow... now thats cool

so you really GOT some work done.

[Chirag 5]

But the lesson to be learnt here is that if you talk in the right way to the right people you can get things done even with RIM!

47310[/snapback]

True! and thats how each time, most of us get our work done!

[linuxguy 0]

The problem with them is that they have too many customers AND they aren't ready to REALLY look into the matter. As in your case, they didn't really look into the matter that lead to the initial confusion which was later resolved...

[ashoksoft 83]

kewl work anujit! at last u learnt things the hard way! hehe remember apna conversation over the breezers ... ages ago ... well does something ring a bell ... ? ? ?

Any way! cheers at having the issue resolved (btw where are u on the 30th ) in Pune or in Mumbai (check with ur schedules...)

Cheers

Ashok

[Arun 795]

But the lesson to be learnt here is that if you talk in the right way to the right people you can get things done even with RIM! So the people who keep b*i*t*c*h*i*n about unresolved problems - there is hope!     

47310[/snapback]

Exactly ! Its hard work, and need some patience too ! Atleast its good to hear that such cases do get resolved in the end. Especially when *333 level 1 support doesn't help much, ask them to forward your call to their superior for a better chance of solving the problem.

[anujit 0]

Ashok:

Firstly please dont tell anyone I had breezers it isn't something I'm proud of. Secondly if you mean 30th of Nov then I'm in Pune. And thirdly no I dont remember any of our conversation that night related to this problem!

[Shabz 8]

The RCC level 1 is rarely of any use and for small problems also they take long time the best thing is to write a mail to chairman office and anujit can you give the mail id of those 3 honchos

[linuxguy 0]

never had any problem with level 1 CC. I never had to escalate the call to a superior to get my problems solved

[ashoksoft 83]

or putting it lightly ... u never really had issues with RIM... which means u are not exploiting ur connection to the fullest ;D

Cheers

Ashok

PS: Just joking mate

[linuxguy 0]

Actually, its not my connection. I am with Orange while my mum uses RIM. And you're right she doesn't make full use of the potential! She doesn't use the FREE SMS facility! Just imagine, I could sent THOUSANDS of FREE SMSes.... I do send many but not much