Monday, February 21, 2005

Comp USA has Miserable service.

I ordered a very simple item - a wireless microsoft mouse in groovy color. The Internet order system claimed it was in stock and available. Unfortunately this turned out to be false. Contained below are a few excerpts (jazzed up with bold and italics and bold-italics for effect) from a letter I just sent to their customer service department - we shall see what happens.

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I entered the store - there was one or two people in line. I had forgotten my sales receipt so the sales person went to the store room to check if my item had been selected. He did not find anything under my name in the stock room, so he called another person to the front to ask for assistance. This person stated - "Oh, I don't think we have that in that color". Which I immediately thought odd as the Internet listed it as in stock. This new person, wearing pants barely remaining on, walked towards the back. I watched as he turned into a particular aisle - becoming concerned that this Internet Pickup process was clearly broken - I followed him to see if what I was seeking was present. He had apparently been distracted and was doing something else entirely so I walked directly out of the store. On the way home I called the store and was routed through the voice mail system 4 times (pressing zero, waiting 6 or more rings then back to voice mail, pressing zero, etc.) before finally having a person answer the phone. I requested to speak to a manager and was placed on hold. After a few minutes someone picked up that claimed to be the sales manager. I began to explain the situation and my unhappiness with the Internet pickup process. He stated that "Well it usually helps" to which I said in an elevated tone: "AHA - usually helps, is a far cry from works!", to which he replied: "Don't raise your voice or I'll hang up on you", I beat him to the button and hung up on him after stating abruptly: "Goodbye!" I assure you I will NEVER again even remotely consider CompUSA for a purchase - which is quite unfortunate as my last computer purchase was from your store in Monroeville, PA.

The following improvements were noted - hey I'm a consultant and offer process improvement as part of my job - they're getting free service here.

  • Perhaps some modecum of training in proper customer service would enable you to keep customers.
  • Perhaps a usable inventory system - controlled by perhaps a "computer" would enable items ordered and listed as "in stock" to be "in stock".
  • Perhaps looking on the "computer" would have enabled the first sales person to have told me the item wasn't in stock instead of checking the store room.
  • Wednesday, February 16, 2005

    The Blue Marble

    While wandering the web this morning I found this site. It has a lot of very interesting images of earth from space. Haven't done a lot of looking yet.