Customer Service

One of my major annoyances is 'Poor Customer Service". It can't be classified as a pet peeve because it is bigger than that. A pet peeve is a minor annoyance that an individual identifies as particularly annoying to him or her, to a greater degree than others may find it.

I think we, as Jamaicans, have accepted poor customer service from every walks of life because we do not know better, or we do not know our rights. Companies have separate departments for customer service for a reason; they have realized that service is what keeps customers and not just products. We will find that the monopoly companies are not so high on the list of offering good support to their customers and they have the power to offer crap and know that most of us can't do anything about it. Perfect examples are JPS and NWC. Their tag line should be - We have the handle and you have the blade.

But What about a company that is in a saturated market and there are lots of competition that will attract the same customers that you are targeting?

Poor service in this case, pisses me off greatly.

My list of places that offers poor customer service:

1. Cool Petroleum - Toll Gate - Clarendon

2. LP Azar - Cross Roads

3. Digicel - Tropical Plaza

and most recent

4. The Deck - New Kingston

I will admit that in these organizations, there are persons who do try to uplift the company by giving good customer service, but in all fairness, one person cannot bring a company to success when others are bringing it down.

Friday night, I went with some friends to The Deck to shoot some pool, have some drinks and just have a good laid back night.

Upon arrival, my first thought was that there are no waitresses on the floor... I played it off thinking that it is a Friday night and it was pretty late and there were a lot of people there. We found a spot to hang out and had our own little party going on; then a brilliant genie appeared on my right ear advising me to go and order some food. Since I did not see anyone working the floor, me and my friend went to the bar to order. After standing for over five minutes without being acknowledged, I stopped making excuses that they were busy. My friend was signalling one of the waitresses who totally ignored her, then I stepped up and attempted to signal her also. She looked at me, I started talking, and she walked off. My speed of anger from 0 - 100 was unbelievable fast, so I ignored her and waited while my friend tried in vain to get the attention of another waitress. Finally, one, who appeared to be a supervisor, came over and offered us a menu and took our order... she even took us over to the other bar where she assigned a waitress to us and made sure we were taken care of.

If it wasn't for that one supervisor, I would not go back to that venue. They are rude, distasteful and have no manners. Whomever is offering them training need to visually monitor how they work under strained circumstances... It's either they are more focused on customers whom they think will give them a good tip or it's a stereotype field where they pick out who they want to served... whatever the case, they will lose more than they will gain with people like those working in their company.

If you go to a venue/company where you are are not getting good customer service, express yourself... I'm not saying to get all bhuttu and ghetto and all, because sometimes that is all they leave you to do to get some form of good service from them. If you are not satisfied with the treatment, leave or find someone superior to talk to... half the times, the front liners are not worth crap and go to the people good, good workplace and try to be somebody when in the end they are offering shit for customer service.

You did not walk on the street and pick up your money (I'm not referring to the ladies/men of the night here), so therefore, your hard earned cash - no matter how you earned it - should be well spent on a company that deserves it. Don't let one or two persons from an organization let you think bad of the company... unless it's a repeated offense that is well known throughout the organization.

So, for now, I'm going to give those places a break... they might not miss me and my friends money, but another company will sure benefit from it.

I am yours truly,

the original DivaKnockoff

xoxo