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I HATE Customer Service Phone Trees
Okay, I should add a qualifier: I hate customer service phone trees with no option to talk to a real person.
I spent about half-an-hour online (none of the options fit), then on the phone, with FedEx trying to get some information on a recent problem. The problem? For the last four FedEx deliveries, the driver left our package on the ground by our mailbox instead of bringing it up to our house. Our mailbox (as well as our neighbors’) are on the common driveway right off the main road. It’s also a quarter-mile from the house and not visible. In other words, packages left by our mailboxes are easy targets for thieves. FedEx used to bring them to the house, and UPS always has.
I was about to explode when I thought I should look for a local number. I found one, called the number, and there was the option—press 9 to speak to a representative! Halleluiah! The young lady said she couldn’t help me with the problem, but she transferred me to the FedEx mother ship and a real person answered the phone. This lady listened to my complaint, took down some information, then said they’ll get back to me. Okay, maybe they won’t, but at least I managed to break though their shield (a shield worthy of a Star Trek battle cruiser).
Just for giggles, I typed “I hate phone tree customer service” into DuckDuckGo and found a ton of info out there about how much people hate phone trees, some humorous such as this.
Okay, that’s my rant, and “Have a nice day!”
Published in Business
I haven’t checked it out lately, but there’s this site called “Get Human” (https://gethuman.com) that is a running database of the numbers you need to call or the procedures to follow to get to a human being ASAP.
I also hate those customer service phone trees, especially the ones that make you SPEAK your responses instead of punching in numbers. I will frequently just give up if I can’t get to a human quickly.
Put together an interesting sign to direct all deliveries except postal to your house.
Do these other services think they are adjuncts to the USPS?
Every time you receive a FedEx parcel, report it as not received/stolen. The driver will be chastised and your parcels will become safer than Caesar’s wife.
Those dumba$$es left a case of antique books on my front steps during a rain storm in June. My wife was home and ringing the bell would have alerted her. “Good afternoon, Ma’am. Here’s a parcel for your husband.” Instead, she went out by another door, did not see the parcel, and water soaked through and spoiled an original set of Groves’ Dictionary of Music and Musicians. We reported this, of course, and FedEx paid the dealer for the cost of the books.
The next time I received a FedEx delivery during a rain shower, the parcel was in a clear plastic bag. Not such a hard thing to do, no?
I can’t speak for all of them but some of those trees without a “real person” option can be circumvented by speaking “representative” or hitting “0” (sometimes a different number like “1” or “9”) regardless of whether there’s a prompt.
My pet peeve is the now omnipresent “We are experiencing extraordinary call volumes and all of our representatives are busy . . . ”
Well, yeah, I’m sure both of your representatives are busy.
I understand both your frustrations with phone trees and with delivery services.
We have a similar but opposite problem with our delivery services. We live at the end of a private, single lane, 1/4 mile long, gravel (and mud) road, with mailboxes also at the main intersection.
Our desire is have the packages left at the mailboxes because the trucks come down the drive, then try to turn around in our pasture. The last fed-ex truck got stuck in the mud, and I had to leave work, get the tractor and pull him out.
We have instructed the various services to leave our package at the mailbox and send me a text that it was left, so we can retrieve it. We also have a piece of paper in the mailbox with this instruction, which alternate drivers can use.
But Stad I didn’t hear any background music to this rant. If you don’t have background music is it really a phone tree rant? Agree with @drewinwisconsin about the ones when you have to speak rather than punch the numbers in. Another way to lengthen the time you’re online while you speak over and over again because the ‘person’ can’t understand you? Sigh.
Companies have been trying for decades to avoid having to talk to people. Talking to people requires staff, and staff is expensive. That drove companies to relocate customer call centers to third world countries with low labor costs.
There was a brief time about 15 years ago in which some companies resumed trying to talk to customers because a few companies discovered that during human customer service conversations the company could upsell the customer on new features or a service upgrade. But that time didn’t last (I guess the value of the upsells wasn’t enough to compensate for the cost of the required staff), and companies are generally back in the mode of trying to avoid having to pay staff to talk to customers.
I like the alternative to ask for a call-back (e.g., Amazon). At least you don’t have to hang on the line.
On the deliveries topic, we live in a brand new subdivision. One of the first residents on our street worked from home even before pandemic, and spent an enormous amount of time and effort trying to get FedEx and UPS to recognize the street. We even had some issues with the US Postal Service – an incompetent contractor was assigned to deliver in our neighborhood (enough complaints found their way to the local postmistress that the incompetent contractor was eventually replaced), plus the communal mailboxes got moved a couple of times without telling the residents before the communal mailboxes settled in what now seem to be their permanent locations. It’s real exciting to walk up to where your mailboxes have been only to find that the entire mailbox set is gone. Where’d our mailboxes go? Stolen? No, it turns out just moved around the corner because there had been poor communication among the city planning department, the subdivision developer, and the USPS.
Still, a couple of years on, not all of the streets of the subdivision appear on all the various map programs different delivery drivers use, and a couple of streets are mislabeled on at least one map program popular with delivery drivers. So, one of the most common uses of the neighborhood Facebook group is to match fellow residents with their mis-delivered deliveries. Sunday afternoon there were nearly simultaneous postings from someone with a Walmart grocery delivery on her front step that she hadn’t ordered, and from another person who was missing a Walmart grocery delivery. They got together and rectified the mis-delivery.
I have mixed feelings. On the one hand I completely hate phone trees and call centers of any kind and will go out of my way to avoid them. On the other hand The reason I am gainfully employed is because there are so many call centers and therefore a market for the products my company sells, so while I am not sure we had anything to do with that phone tree. I can say three things, your welcome, I apologize, and thank you. We should cover the multitude of my successes and failings in making these things better.
So you actually get a call-back? I haven’t tried Amazon, but every customer service number at which I have left a call-back request has not called me back.
When I moved into my brand newly-built house in 2000, the Postal Service map did not include it. I went for more than a month not receiving my mail, which resulted in past-due bills and other ill effects. I called the post office every single day, and ended up with my own dedicated employee who helped me until the database was updated, so the maps could be updated with my correct address. I actually met the guy, and he turned out to be very nice.
On that phone tree issue, just keep punching “zero” and that normally will get you to a real person.
The number-one priority of any customer service call system is to get you to hang up the phone.
I get frustrated by the telephone trees that include a “speak to a person ” option, but when I press that option it hangs up on me. Yes, I have had that happen.
Another call frustration is entering information into the automated system to navigate the phone tree, and then when i get to a real person, the person has me repeat orally all the information I just put in using the telephone keypad.
Fed Ex is a tough nut to crack. My wife has been in tears over their failure to deliver needed medications. I wish I could specify delivery by UPS.
I have to opposite problem. FedEx can reliably find my house. UPS manages about 9/10 times. I am not sure what exactly happens on the 10th time. Once I watched the package go from the hub to Austin be marked as out for delivery and then go back to the hub. Then come back to Austin before it finally arrived at my neighbors house. Not exactly sure why that happened but it was entertaining.
Awesome! Thanks!
That’s what we’re going to do. But heck, even the USPS will drive to the house when a package won’t fit in the mailbox.
When we know something’s coming, we leave the garage door open and the lights on. The UPS driver will always put packages inside the garage when there’s a hint of rain . . .
You’re right. However, I spammed the zero to no avail . . .
I like it when you have the option. We’ve had things stolen from or mailbox before, so bringing packages to the house is a must. We have plenty of room to turn around, even for one of those big UPS trucks.
I have used some phone trees that were useful. Even so, when your problem doesn’t fit the logic structure of the tree, the option for a human is a must . . .
Didn’t work this time. IIRC, the FedEx robovoice said, “That’s not one of the options” after I hit zero . . .
The worst service is the partnership between FedEx, UPS and the USPS. If a merchant claims they sent something by FedEx or UPS and they actually sent it by FedEx SmartPost or the UPS equivalent, we wait a full extra week for delivery. Our letters come from one post office, the packages from another, neither one of which is our actual post office. There is no phone number to call. If you have a problem you have to walk in to all three post offices and still often do not resolve the issue.
Cable TV is another customer service boondoggle. We had to have an deteriorating old buried line replaced and the only reason we were able to do so is because my husband knew some higher up on a charity board of directors and very reluctantly called in a favor.
Our plumber, a family-run business for over 100 years, uses a phone tree answering system because they were spending all of their time fielding spam calls.
I’m guessing the FedEx person who made the last four deliveries was new and didn’t see the little sign in my neighbors yard with our house number and an arrow. We usually have the same UPS driver for a few years, then they change.
In my experience, Amazon excels in customer service at all levels.
Same here. We’ve had very good service from them, especially responses to problems.
Thirded. They start out with the idea that the caller might actually be right.
They also seem skilled at finding overseas call centers that are actually above ground and populated by English speakers.