Jew Make the Call -- Large Hardware Supply Store Edition
*** WARNING *** This story is long. If you don't have the patience, scroll to bottom for the cliffs ******
You are an escalations specialist for a large hardware supply store chain in the US. You handle customer reports of dissatisfaction or employee/manager misbehavior. You are also in charge of compensating the customer if they deserve it.
You receive a report from "Steve", about a terrible series of events involving an appliance order. From taking Steve's report and then investigating the matter with all employees involved, you conclude the following occurred:
- On April 24, "Steve" ordered an appliance online from your chain which was in high demand. Steve was quoted a delivery date of May 7.
- Steve's delivery was on schedule all the way through May 7. However, on the morning of delivery, Steve got an e-mail that his delivery was delayed eight weeks (!!), and would now be on July 2.
- Obviously unhappy about this, Steve attempted to reach out to online customer support, but they were being inundated with calls, and he couldn't reach anyone. Steve then reached out to his local store, which is supposed to help people when they have issues with online orders. (Additionally, the online portal simply transfers the order to the local store to process and get the profits from, anyway.)
- At the local store, Steve reached an assistant manager named Manuel. Manuel attempted to help Steve by looking into it for him, and agreed that the delivery was mishandled -- especially not informing him of the delay until the morning of supposed delivery! Upon researching it, Manuel concluded that corporate oversold the item and Steve got put to the back of the line when they couldn't deliver, and his order was now behind everyone who had ordered after him. Manuel promised twice to give a loaner appliance "within a week", free of charge, until his delayed item arrived on July 2. Manuel promised Steve to call him "in 2 days" to schedule it.
- Manuel discovered that he couldn't keep his promise. His higher-ups wouldn't let him give out free loaners of high-demand items, which he thought he had authorization to do. Rather than break this news to Steve, Manuel made the bad decision to simply not return Steve's call, avoid him, and not take any calls from him going forward. He figured Steve would get tired of the run-around and just go away.
- After not hearing from Manuel for over a week, Steve put a lot of effort out to reach him. When Steve kept calling and kept asking other employees how to find him, including other assistant managers, Manuel knew he couldn't just hide anymore.
- Manuel called Steve and attempted to lie to him. He said that he "never promised" the loaner appliance, and that Steve "misunderstood". When asked why he never called him back as promised, Manuel claimed, "It's really busy, sometimes these things happen." Knowing that he really was promised this item, and that Manuel was lying to him, Steve started to argue, and insisted that the promise to help him was broken, and that he wanted the truth about what really occurred.
- Manuel decided he was tired of Steve and made a third bad decision. He got really frustrated that Steve wasn't believing his lies, and ranted about how he "learned his lesson about ever trying to help an online customer", and called Steve "unappreciative". When Steve responded, "Help me how? You promised something never called me back, and are now lying about what you promised?", Manuel got even angrier and made his fourth bad decision. He told Steve he was going to cancel his order as punishment for being so unappreciative because "it's the right thing to do". Steve started screaming at him that he had better not maliciously cancel the order, and Manuel decided this was all too stressful and hung up on Steve, and then instructed all employees there not to take Steve's call anymore.
- Manuel walked over to the computer to punitively cancel Steve's order, but then panic came over him. He heard Steve threaten to "get you fired if you dare cancel it" before hanging up on him. He realized that he was risking his job in a terrible job market just for some petty revenge against a customer. Manuel had a change of heart, and called the online order department to call Steve and work things out with him. Manuel told the online order department, "I authorize $100 credit to Steve for his trouble" for this item which costs $550, and then instructed them to call Steve "immediately" and try to help him. Manuel hoped this would pacify Steve and prevent a complaint which might end up getting him fired.
- Unfortunately, the online department calling Steve had someone incompetent calling him, and that person couldn't rectify much. That rep did notice that the same appliance was still being sold with a delivery date of May 26, which was really strange given that Steve was being delayed until July 2 on his much earlier order. Steve was simply told to re-order the item with the May 26 delivery date, and to cancel the other one, and it would all be okay, and then he'd get his $100 after. Steve doubted this was going to work out, and was afraid the May 26 delivery date was BS. The rep said the department managing inventory was closed already, but promised a callback at noon the following day, at which point they could call the right department together. The rep then pressured Steve to end the call by "taking a survey about my performance", which Steve declined "until the second call tomorrow is done, because we're only half done right now". The rep got upset about this, because he wasn't actually planning to call Steve (in reality he can't make scheduled calls at his level), and had simply promised to call the next day in order to get a higher survey rating, which now Steve was refusing to do until the next day when he'd get called back. The rep tried to push Steve 4 more times to take the survey on the spot, which Steve kept refusing, and he finally politely ended the call with the empty promise to call back.
- Steve made 3 other calls to the national customer service numbers to reps who either were too confused/incompetent to understand what was going on, and gave incorrect information, or who got frustrated and purposely disconnected the call while on hold.
- At this point, Steve finally reached you, who listened to the story, talked to the reps, and came to the above conclusions.
In your conversations with Manuel, he admitted to the above, stating that he "was nervous about calling the customer back after I promised something I couldn't deliver" and "lost my temper when the customer wasn't happy with the fact that I was avoiding him, because at the time I felt he was being ungrateful". He admitted to also telling the customer that he would punish him by cancelling his order, claiming it to be a "moment of weakness which I immediately thought better of" after hanging up, noting that he ultimately chose not to cancel the order, but instead authorized a $100 credit and had the online department call Steve.
In your conversations with the online rep, he admitted "I was so afraid the customer would give me a bad rating on the end-of-call survey if I didn't promise a callback during the day" that he made a false promise to call him back. The rep also admitted he "probably pushed a bit too hard" to get Steve to take the survey on the first call, when he was frustrated that his lie backfired and that Steve wouldn't rate him until the (impossible to make) second call took place.
Manuel and the online rep were both referred to their immediate supervisors for disciplinary action.
Unfortunately, Steve's second order was also put on even later backorder (now July 20), and while his original order was restored, he's still looking at a July 2 date, which is unfortunately behind other orders placed laters than his, and the system doesn't allow you to modify that.
Again, Steve's item is $550, and he already has a $100 credit authorized by Manuel during that entire debacle.
Given all of the bullshit that occurred, how much total do you think Steve deserves off his $550 order?
Cllifs:
- An unknown system error caused Steve to believe for 2 weeks that his order was coming, only to be delayed 8 weeks on the morning of scheduled delivery, and that put him BEHIND other orders made substantially after his. There is no way to fix this.
- Local assistant manager Manuel made a promise of a loaner to Steve in the meantime, couldn't keep that promise, attempted to avoid Steve and wouldn't take his calls, and then when Steve reached him, he lied about it, and lost his temper when Steve wasn't believing him. Then he lost his temper further and told Steve he would cancel his order to punish him, before calming down and not actually doing that.
- Online department rep lied to Steve about a next-day callback in order to get a better survey rating, and then when Steve didn't want to do the survey until the next day, rep became pushy and kept insisting he do the survey (and then ultimately didn't call back because he couldn't).
- Other online department reps were either rude, incompetent, or both, because the problem was too complex for them to understand.
How much credit should Steve get for his $550 order?
