I’ve written about Jasper Griegson’s The Complete Complainer on my other blog and I used some of the things I learnt from that book in writing this letter.
It could be improved but it did get a response, though not the one I was hoping for. I probably should’ve waited a while before sending it because sending an complaint when you’re upset is one of the things Griegson recommends that you don’t do. I thought the letter would be helpful to others intending to write such letters.
Dear Sir:
Imagine logging on to your computer in the morning to check your email and finding that your account has expired. Imagine this happening when you are on an unlimited pack (64 kbps) and have been on this pack for more than two years. Imagine calling the customer care and being told that there is a daily download limit of 150 MB, which was never mentioned either by the service provider or by the Sify renewal department.
My pack has apparently expired because I used 210 MB on one day (10/July/2008), even though the pack was supposed to be valid till the 12th. Furthermore, I was not in town for 4 days during which I did not download anything. That’s 600 MB worth of downloads, which I apparently cannot use.
If you call a pack unlimited, then it should be unlimited, not “partially unlimited” as your customer care representative put it. In addition, if you are using an expiry by date method, then don’t use the download method. Or provide a monthly download limit without a date attached. To use both a daily limit and a date-based expiry is an unfair practice on your part. In addition, the use of the word
unlimited signifies “no limit”. How can you justify this duplicity?
Your customer care executive asked me to email you in spite of the fact that I did not have an Internet connection (Note: I should’ve said that my Internet connection had expired). The other option she said was to contact my service provider who I have not dealt with for over a year.
I have been dealing with Sify and I cannot understand how you don’t provide an escalation mechanism. When I asked to speak to a supervisor, your executive said that she could not transfer the call. Is this a deliberate way to ensure that customers are frustrated?
I have been a Sify subscriber for over two years now and for the most part I have been satisfied with the service. However, such an incident really makes me wonder whether Sify cares about its customers or only about making money, even if it means tricking the customer.
I am extremely disappointed by the way I have been treated. Please address this issue by reactivating my account and by providing me with the account compensation for the trouble that you are causing me.
Clearly, not the best ending as well but not a bad letter overall, if I may say so myself. Any thoughts from the three (fine, two!) of you who read this blog?
Categories: Communication · Customer Service
Tagged: Complaints, Customers, Letters
I watched an old man get down from a bus yesterday. The last step of the bus was probably 1.5 feet off the ground, so the old man had to steady himself, grab the handle-bar and then gingerly first put one foot on the ground, and then another and let go off the bar. It took a couple of seconds and it didn’t help that the bus driver was already threatening to move or that there were passengers waiting to get in.
It’s hard for older folks when they get on the bus too, because again they have to hoist themselves up and at their age it isn’t easy. (I’m not including the problems people with disabilities face in this post because that’s a whole other topic and requires a different post.)
Making it easier to get onto the bus or get off would be the first thing that bus manufacturers should do. One way to fix this would be to have a retractable step that the driver could control, so the step is much closer to the ground. This technology is not new and is already being used in buses. I’m sure that there are other options that I haven’t considered but this was the most obvious one I could think of.
With average life expectancy increasing, it means that there will be more people who are in their 60s and 70s. So, designers and manufacturers had better start considering these folks when they are creating products.
Categories: Design · Usability
Tagged: Buses, Elderly
A couple of months ago, I was at a meeting with a prospective client. The developer (or project leader) was demonstrating his company’s web-based product to give me an idea of the work involved.
While watching the demo, I was easily able to pick out inconsistencies in the user interface, even though I wasn’t there to evaluate the user interface. Problems with hyperlinks (colours and fonts), problems with button use, problems with messages, problems with the flow of the application–they stood out in a demo, one where I was an observer. (Note: This had nothing to do with my eye for usability; the inconsistencies would’ve been picked out by anyone.)
When I pointed out a couple of these issues, the person said that they were planning to do a revamp of the user interface or something of the sort. The impression I got, however, was that they were talking about surface improvements in the UI more than anything else. Also, these were the sort of errors that could be fixed relatively easily and don’t require large-scale revamps in my opinion.
There were other problems in the application, ones that would take longer to fix, and that would need some kind of evaluation to find. The company, however, was looking at someone to create a user manual rather than someone to fix the inherent problems in the application. Now I’m all for user documentation but given how reluctant users are to read the fine manual, it makes more sense to invest some time into the design and usability of the application.
Think about how many times you’ve stumbled because of the way a product was designed. Now think about how many times you ran to the manual to figure out your problem. It’s more likely that you tried tinkering around with the product or asked someone before you read the manual.
Which is why it makes sense to invest in some sort of usability evaluation, internal or external, to iron out the flaws in the product. No amount of documentation will solve inherent flaws in a product and sometimes they’ll come across as band-aid fixes.
Sometimes you just need surgery to fix the problem.
Categories: Design · Software · Technology · Usability
Tagged: Documentation, Testing
I was trying to register for a service at ICICI Bank and after entering the information and clicking Submit, I was taken to an orphan page (no links to anything) which displayed the following:
APPLICATION SETUP ERROR !!
This error has occured due to a problem in the application setup
Please contact the Administrator of your Bank.
Now the question is, Who is the administrator of my bank? Is it the bank’s website administrator? (Probably) Is it the administrator of the branch where my account is? (Unlikely) Is it someone else? (No clue)
Errors will occur. What distinguishes the good applications from the also-rans is the way in which they handle errors. In this case, for instance, the message could’ve been changed to:
Oops. If you’re seeing this, it means that we goofed up.
Please click here to notify us and we’ll contact you when the problem’s rectified. Thanks.
I don’t think setting up something like this would be too tough. Sure, it’s an extra bit of work, but it saves your customer from being frustrated. Frustrated customers tell other people about their frustrations, which is not good for your business. Ask Dell.
Then again, I’m no Jeff Jarvis.
Categories: Communication · Customer Service · Software · Usability
Tagged: Error Messages
When I call up my Internet service provider (Sify if you must know) to report a problem, the menu takes me into an option where a voice says:
For non-technical queries, press 1. For technical queries, press 2.
Though I make a choice (usually 2), I wonder how customers are supposed to diffrentiate between a technical and a non-technical query. For customers with no knowledge of computers or networking, every query is technical mumbo jumbo. And, even for customers with a smattering of knowledge, the issue is still far from clear.
To me, it seems like nobody asked the question, What does technical mean and how is it different from non-technical?
And that is a pity because as I write this, there are customers on the phone who are probably confused about what they are supposed to choose.
This post, in case you were wondering, is non-technical.
Categories: Communication · Customer Service · Usability
Go to this Airtel SMS FAQ and click the Expand All button and scroll down a bit. One of the questions you’ll see is this (emphasis mine):
Q: I don’t like the content I am getting.
A: You can select your interests by logging on to the SMS2.0 website on www.sms2.in.
Note to Airtel: Provide user with the URL.
There are others like this on the page, which you can try and find if you are so inclined.
I just think it’s funny that the internal communication between a vendor and a client made it to a web page. Clearly, this was a feature that wasn’t supposed to be out there.
Note to Airtel: Remove the notes.
Categories: Communication · Software
Tagged: Airtel, Funny
I’ve posted about this in the past, but it bears repeating. Joel Spolsky’s book User Interface Design for Programmers should be mandatory reading for any programmer who comes within half a mile of a user interface. Make that a mile.
Heck, anyone with a passing interest in user interfaces should also read the stuff. It’s freely available online, it’s well-written, and it’s useful. What more could anyone want?
Seriously.
Categories: Design · Software · Usability
Tagged: Books
