UK customer service stories

Stu999

Stu999

Stu999

Soldato
Joined
3 Aug 2015
Posts
8,716
I needed some new tyres on my car this week and also have suspicions about the brake pads and discs. Call up well known tyre provider:

Agent: Why do you think you need changes to your brakes?
Me: Constant tyre squeal, mushy brake pedal.
Agent: Well, I can’t tell you, you’ll have to book it in. Will be about £300 per axle.

Had to change the tyres anyway so booked in and booked brake check. Arrived at garage at 10am this morning and it seemed very quiet. About 3 cars total, less than when I’ve had my car in for service.

I’m expecting a phone call to tell me when my car is ready, it only took an hour last time I had them changed. 1:30 rolls around and no call. Luckily I’m very close to the garage so walk over, there’s my car with new tyres in the car park.

Me: I’m here to pick up [my car], it’s under [my name].
Garage guy: Here are the keys, I’ll email your receipt.
Me: And what about the prices for discs and pads.
Garage guy: Oh, I don’t know. Lad who was working on it was on a half day.
Me:……………..

Just got home and realised they didn’t actually even tell me about the condition of the brakes at all.

Now the manufacturer of my car has the prices online at a fixed price. All I need this garage to tell me is higher or lower. Funnily enough, I’m reluctant to use the main dealer with the ‘fixed price’ as last time I had some wear and tear items replaced at ‘fixed price’ they tried to rip me off for double that fixed price and kept me waiting half an hour to speak to the service manager when I called them out on it.

Of course, I have the standard UK service of bar / shop staff continuing to talk to their mates rather than serve anyone behaviour.

/rant over

Anyone else got any customer service woes to share?
 
Last edited:
I have loads of stories about things about customers at my current and previous CS jobs

. Customer wanting to refund a swimming costume with the gusset tape removed - with skid marks :rolleyes: :mad:. I didn't refund her.

. Customer asking why we have stopped selling a branded yoghurt in a certain flavour. He kept asking my colleagues every time he was in for a couple of weeks. I went onto the brand's website and under products, it was not listed. Said and showed to customer that the flavour has been discontinued by the company, not us. The man's response? "That's not good enough"

. Customer handed me a scratchcard to cash in. I immediately recognised it was an old one. The terminal wouldn't pay out. She claimed she bought it from my store the other day. I hate customers using stories like this. We have to do a weekly audit of scratchcards and 80% of the time, its me that does it - so remember what cards we haven't sold in ages.

. When I worked at a call centre with a free phone number. A man (guessing in his 50s) rang the number to ask for the time. It could take 10 mins to speak to someone
 
I've been scratching my head with IT suppliers for a while now.

People ringing to confirm details of what we need, question after question and then they say "leave it with me and I'll get back to you later today no later than tomorrow". Yep, never heard anything from them so thanks for wasting 20 mins on the phone!

Worst one was a large supplier who we ordered about 8k worth of kit from. Half turned up in a week and the rest... Order cancelled due to lack of parts.

Spoke to them and they agreed to replace the part (think it was a memory module) with a different one and resubmit the order.

The original order included the first 4k worth of kit we already received and the whole lot had increased prices across the entire order!

When they asked if the quote was OK and can they submit it, I was like... Absolutely not! We will pay extra for the one bit not in stock (if we have to) but the rest that they increased the price on and delayed the whole order because of some memory issue - no chance. The 4k we were missing ended up being requoted at about 5k.

Eventually, as a goodwil gesture, they honored the original price and we got the kit last week after about 6 months of waiting! (from the original PO submission date)
 
One of the reasons I use a main dealer near me for a lot of work :( though as main dealers go their prices are generally OK, they mostly pile it on, on stuff like windscreen wipers which are easy to do yourself anyhow. But they do at least call you when they say they will and get on with the job, etc. I've tried many of the indy garages, etc. around here and just found the service far too terrible despite the lower cost - though I had a similar story with the main VW commercial dealer for the area as well where once they have your money they just don't want to know and it can literally take days to get the person you want to speak to on the phone.
 
Hate call centres that their staff follow a script everything they do. It doesn’t show customer service.

My call centre jobs, the only times I had to go through a script was things like direct debit guarantee and if anything I did on the call such as changing, adding or removing something- the new terms covering that part of the contract.
 
I worked as tech support between 2003 and 2009, so Windows XP and Vista era. The computers we sold were for the educational market, funded by LEAs (local educational authorities), so not a competitor of OcUK.

I've had my fair share of starfish.

- customers introducing a virus on their PC because they went on porn / illegal software sites.

- customers who beat around the bush.

- alcoholics who weren't able to provide a straight answer.

- customers who installed IncrediMail. Although IncrediMail is claimed not to be malware, virtually EVERY computer that we brought into our workshop that had IncrediMail installed on it also had malware.

- customers who cannot use Google or YouTube for something routine such as changing printer cartridges. Talking them through this over the telephone gets tedious.

- customers who installed 2 anti-virus programs because they thought that having 2 AVs was better than having 1. The 2 AVs both try to control real-time scanning and so they end up fighting over each other which slows down the computer.

- customers who try to get tech support for their iPod / Mp3 player and other devices that we don't sell.

- 1 customer tried to get tech support while queuing up for a ride at Alton Towers. As it was a cheeky call, I cheekily asked back what ride she was queuing for. She said the Runaway Mine Train, and I said - shift up a gear and go on Oblivion :)

- 1 customer complained to us because their son was spending too much money on eBay. What were we supposed to do about that?!

- We also had a couple of cases where the customer who got given the computer by their LEA sold the computer on (which is actually fraud) and the new person then tried to get tech support from us. We told them that the warranty lied firmly with the original LEA customer.

- We also had "smart idiots" who were knowledgeable in their field and could do absolutely stunning work in AutoCAD / Photoshop / Illustrator etc, and yet they still bugger up their Windows installation by turning their PC off at the wall while XP was installing a service pack.

I'm sure there are some other tech support guys in this forum who can relate!
 
Pawnless Endgame said:
- customers introducing a virus on their PC because they went on porn / illegal software sites.
Click to expand...

Different way around but your post reminded me of when I worked with an IT guy who was very hot on security stuff, full of himself when it came to best practises and always condescending about it. Then one day being lazy hooked up his personal laptop to a closed production network to install a printer driver and infected it with malware...

EDIT: I hasten to add this wasn't a dig at you.
 
Last edited:
Sent this email to the CEO of Playstation Europe this morning:

Good morning Mr Ryan,

I hope you're well. Apologies for emailing you directly but I've got an issue which is going unresolved and unfortunately Playstation doesn't have a support email.

Quick breakdown:

11/12/2023: Raised a ticket for a faulty controller - no. 666
14/12/2023: Return label received from Playstation
15/12/2023: Controller sent out
11/01/2024: Email received that item has been dispatched
11/01/2024: Tracking number given by Playstation for DPD is 666
23/01/2024: DPD still stating item not received
23/01/2024: Spoke to someone on your chat facility, informed me that a ticket had been raised, given support no. 666

As of today still no confirmation, no correspondence, DPD stating item still not received.

Please can you send this on to someone who is able to help.

Thanks and have a good day.

Kind regards,
Click to expand...

Can't fault them, they've already responded with a brand new controller being sent out. Just a shame I had to escalate to the CEO of the company before getting a satisfactory response.

Also, special mention to Octopus, we moved house recently and they screwed up, sent them an email and they sorted it sharpish.

I really wish all companies had an email address, I'd rather let them take a day or two to respond to me than spend forever on hold due to "higher than usual call volumes" which as we all know is a constant thing for most companies.


(see @nlel1975, that's how you do emails :D)
 
Last edited:
My local garage is really good.

I phone up.
Car needs an mot and the exhaust is hanging off.
"OK bring it down on Monday and we'll get it done on Tuesday"
Call up on Tuesday
"so no surprise it's failed mot but only on the exhaust. Price is 400 for part on Thursday or 220 if you can wait until next week"
I'll wait until next week.
get a call on Tuesday, "cars all done mate, 333 for mot, exhaust and labour"


When had gear box serviced he even took it home with him to make sure it was actually done.

Having an honest, genuine garage is a godsend!


I've actually not had any bad customer service in last few year or so apart from DPD. And I no longer use them to send.
 
Last edited:
Went to a well-known supermarket, let's call it Sainsbury's and they didn't have my favourite yoghurt. I asked a member of the chilled staff who told me to check back another day. I came back the next week and asked another member of staff who said they hadn't had it in a while and to try again later. Again, I returned a few days later and asked a member of staff who said they'd already told me they didn't have it and then consulted another staff member who rudely shoved their phone in my face and shouted something about the manufacturer not selling the yoghurt anymore. It was really rude and they could have told me they didn't stock it because the manufacturer didn't make it anymore in a much politer and timelier manner so I told them it wasn't good enough and went elsewhere feeling deflated that I could no longer eat my yoghurt and about the poor customer service.
 
Quite a few years ago I joyfully bounced into a branch of my bank to pay my mortgage off and was served by a girl who looked like she'd just left school, and as it turned out, didn't really partake in the education bit.
Anyhoo, all the paperwork etc was done, and then she proceeded to ask me if i'd like to take out a bank loan.
Took the wind right out of my sails that did.
I wasn't expecting a ticker-tape parade with balloons and a cake, but FFS.
In full Karen mode I did ask to speak to the manager and asked him why the **** would I want a loan when I've just given them a bunch of money, but it fell on deaf ears.
 
JonRGV250 said:
Quite a few years ago I joyfully bounced into a branch of my bank to pay my mortgage off and was served by a girl who looked like she'd just left school, and as it turned out, didn't really partake in the education bit.
Anyhoo, all the paperwork etc was done, and then she proceeded to ask me if i'd like to take out a bank loan.
Took the wind right out of my sails that did.
I wasn't expecting a ticker-tape parade with balloons and a cake, but FFS.
In full Karen mode I did ask to speak to the manager and asked him why the **** would I want a loan when I've just given them a bunch of money, but it fell on deaf ears.
Click to expand...

she was doing her job, sorry but I think your over reacting on this one, she has probably been asked to offer loans to every customer

its like when you go to the submarket and don't have a Clubcard and don't want one, yet you get asked every time you go into a supermarket
they are only doing their job
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom