Need to vent because I'm upset at myself.

[floweredangel]

So I had a customer I had to deal with through work, and I just felt so frustrated and upset with dealing with her.

She emails us and lets us know that for 6 months she hasn't been able to get into her digital subscription. She changed her email address because apparently the other one got hacked or so on. Fine, but she then goes and removes her old email address from the website where she's signed in (which would have told her that this only removes the email from the website, it does not cancel any subscription that she has with us)

So now 6 months later I let her know that because she removed her email address from the website we have her account and it's still showing active but we cannot make changes to it to transfer it to her new email address, and we can't view the credit card information so we can switch it to a new account we can set up for her.

She proceeds to yell at me that she's been trying to contact us for 6 months, has phoned and never gets through (yes, we have live customer service and the hours are available, there is also an voicemail service for after hours calls)

I advise her that she would have still had access to her account during that time, regardless of the email address as it is set up as a login ID and she can use her password and access the paper. As I'm trying to let her know we can set up a new account and purge the old one but we need to obtain her credit card information to get it set up again she keeps interrupting me at every turn. It gets heated, and I was NOT at my best for keeping calm and I'm very upset about this. I let her know that we could refund her the last month and then start it up again fresh, but she insisted we refund her for 6 months. I let her know we cannot do this as we only received her email this week.

I should have tried to be calmer and more understanding. I should have tried to explain very clearly and slowly regardless of the interruptions that the most we can refund is a month and then go from there. She told me to forget the whole thing and slammed the phone in my ear.

Now, I don't want to be unreasonable, but if you have a problem with a company wouldn't you want to let them know immediately, especially when you are being billed every month? I know if I was being charged for something I wasn't receiving I would be phoning/emailing until I received a response. Is waiting 6 months (she stated clearly that she knew about the problem 6 months ago) and then demanding a full refund reasonable?? Within our customer service limits, no, but I don't know. I reacted badly and shouldn't have let her get to me

[Natalka]

Perhaps it would have been best if you transferred her to a supervisor.

[TudorChick]

sounds like she was expecting too much.had it been a problem she should have called ASAP.waiting and then wanting a full refund is unreasonable.i would have just transferred her over or said something like "i can give you a 1 month refund,i am sorry i cannot help you further,would you like to speak to my supervisor?"

[taxsavey]

So I had a customer I had to deal with through work, and I just felt so frustrated and upset with dealing with her.

She emails us and lets us know that for 6 months she hasn't been able to get into her digital subscription. She changed her email address because apparently the other one got hacked or so on. Fine, but she then goes and removes her old email address from the website where she's signed in (which would have told her that this only removes the email from the website, it does not cancel any subscription that she has with us)

So now 6 months later I let her know that because she removed her email address from the website we have her account and it's still showing active but we cannot make changes to it to transfer it to her new email address, and we can't view the credit card information so we can switch it to a new account we can set up for her.

She proceeds to yell at me that she's been trying to contact us for 6 months, has phoned and never gets through (yes, we have live customer service and the hours are available, there is also an voicemail service for after hours calls)

I advise her that she would have still had access to her account during that time, regardless of the email address as it is set up as a login ID and she can use her password and access the paper. As I'm trying to let her know we can set up a new account and purge the old one but we need to obtain her credit card information to get it set up again she keeps interrupting me at every turn. It gets heated, and I was NOT at my best for keeping calm and I'm very upset about this. I let her know that we could refund her the last month and then start it up again fresh, but she insisted we refund her for 6 months. I let her know we cannot do this as we only received her email this week.

I should have tried to be calmer and more understanding. I should have tried to explain very clearly and slowly regardless of the interruptions that the most we can refund is a month and then go from there. She told me to forget the whole thing and slammed the phone in my ear.

Now, I don't want to be unreasonable, but if you have a problem with a company wouldn't you want to let them know immediately, especially when you are being billed every month? I know if I was being charged for something I wasn't receiving I would be phoning/emailing until I received a response. Is waiting 6 months (she stated clearly that she knew about the problem 6 months ago) and then demanding a full refund reasonable?? Within our customer service limits, no, but I don't know. I reacted badly and shouldn't have let her get to me

In all fairness, there is no acceptable excuse for yelling. However, I know from experience a person can and do slip thru cracks. I have had this happen on many an occasion. Its not your fault, but it is extrmely unprofessional of the company. It puts the customer in an impossible situcation. For eg. I called a co once and waited as I got passed around only to be disconnected 2 times, on hold for an hour. When I did finally get thru, no one returned my call. That is super frusterating. What exactly are they suppose to do. Its assumed a company is doing their job, with all the technologyl, often it happens that is not always the case. I think take a deep breath and get her to a supervisor. Take a step back and try to see it thru their point of view after receiving her facts as she sees them. That is business.

[floweredangel]

You're all right.

I am the supervisor and my manager would have told her the same thing, though I should have just let it go there when she started to yell. I SHOULD have just said, I'm sorry ma'am, this is the best we can do in this situation, however I will have my manager call you back if you'd prefer that.

I let myself get flustered and I tried to reason with her and that was the wrong thing to do since I was upset.

In a clear case where we made an error, a refund of 6 to 12 months isn't a problem. In a case where the customer makes an error and decides to wait 6 months before notifying us is a different matter though.

[nothingfancy]

You're all right.

I am the supervisor and my manager would have told her the same thing, though I should have just let it go there when she started to yell. I SHOULD have just said, I'm sorry ma'am, this is the best we can do in this situation, however I will have my manager call you back if you'd prefer that.

I let myself get flustered and I tried to reason with her and that was the wrong thing to do since I was upset.

In a clear case where we made an error, a refund of 6 to 12 months isn't a problem. In a case where the customer makes an error and decides to wait 6 months before notifying us is a different matter though.

Wow. So sorry that you had to deal with a customer like that. It disgusts me to know that people think that employees can be spoken to like that. But good for you for going over the situation with a calm mind. We all learn from experience and not all difficult customers are alike.

[cricky]

Don't be to hard on yourself. Some customers just bring out the worst in us. I worked in customer contact centres for what felt like forever. Some people are just never happy and take their bad days out on the reps on the phone. She knows she should have contacted the company earlier and is mad at herself for not doing it and taking it out on you. We can only take so much from people before we snap back.

[Sherbear609]

I hated being a csr (icks) feel for you... good luck there is some ppl you just can't reason with...

[ginger150]

Ugh, I worked in customer service for a very short amount of time, and I hated it for this reason.

I have also been a customer who has tried to contact a company to get them fix an error for weeks and weeks, and have been told that I should have contacted them sooner. So I know that can be incredibly frustrating, too. Never the fault of the person who answers the phone though!