MILLENNIAL'S HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHAT CUSTOMER SERVICE IS!!!

chief38

chief38

Member
Bronze Supporter
Joined
Apr 4, 2006
Messages
19,636
Reaction score
31,196
I laugh my butt of daily (in a sad way) when calling a Company's "customer service" department. You spend 20, 30, 40 + minutes on hold and pray they do not cut you off just to start over again. If I am successful and do get a representative on the line, at least 50% of the time I can not understand them because of their thick accent and poor English. I have actually had to hang up and dial all over again in the hope that I will get a different person who speaks our lingo better. Many times after being on hold for 60 minutes, their system times out and they go to a recorded message that prompts you to leave a message and a call back number. It's extremely rare that I actually get a call back! :mad:

Today I had to call an Amazon affiliated Company and I figured I'd try real early because I have not been able to get through over the last 5 days. Today I got through after about 15 minutes on hold but had to hang up - could not understand the person on the other end. After getting through to a second rep. 30 minutes later, the connection was really bad but they said hold the line while she switched phones. This line was better however I could hear Roosters saying good morning every 30 seconds - cockadoodle doo, man......

After a long a grueling conversation and having to repeat myself a few times, I finally got instructions on how to resolve my issue.

They call this "Customer Service" but it SHOULD be called Customer Torture. I guess most here can relate to what I am discussing here, but Millennial's don't have a clue as this is what they have been brought up to believe is normal CS. FRUSTRATING - to say the least!

I guess the days of REAL Customer Service are just about out the window.

But..... let's end on a positive note. I've been trying to buy a spring for a Sig and it's been on their back order list for months. Yesterday I called Sig customer service (30 seconds on hold), spoke to a native New Hampshire man who spoke perfect English and while he said officially the part is on B/O and not being sold currently due to short supply, he would take my order anyway and send me one. Now THAT'S Customer Service!!!!! :)

Rant over. Now I feel better! :p
 
Last edited:
Register to hide this ad
Another vote for excellent customer service from sig. Pleasant to deal with and knowledgeable, although the wait to get through on the phone can be long.


I think it's humorous when you end up in an Indian call center and the CS rep answers the phone with a strong Hindi accent "Hello, my name is Bob" or "Hello, my name is Sara." The first thing that pops into my mind is "No it's not."


chief38 said:
I laugh my butt of daily (in a sad way) when calling a Company's "customer service" department. You spend 20, 30, 40 + minutes on hold and pray they do not cut you off just to start over again. If I am successful and do get a representative on the line, at least 50% of the time I can not understand them because of their thick accent and poor English. I have actually had to hang up and dial all over again in the hope that I will get a different person who speaks our lingo better. Many times after being on hold for 60 minutes, their system times out and they go to a recorded message that prompts you to leave a message and a call back number. It's extremely rare that I actually get a call back! :mad:

Today I had to call an Amazon affiliated Company and I figured I'd try real early because I have not been able to get through over the last 5 days. Today I got through after about 15 minutes on hold but had to hang up - could not understand the person on the other end. After getting through to a second rep. 30 minutes later, the connection was really bad but they said hold the line while she switched phones. This line was better however I could hear Roosters saying good morning every 30 seconds - cockadoodle doo, man......

After a long a grueling conversation and having to repeat myself a few times, I finally got instructions on how to resolve my issue.

They call this "Customer Service" but it SHOULD be called Customer Torture. I guess most here can relate to what I am discussing here, but Millennial's don't have a clue as this is what they have been brought up to believe is normal CS. FRUSTRATING - to say the least!

I guess the days of REAL Customer Service are just about out the window.

But..... let's end on a positive note. I've been trying to buy a spring for a Sig and it's been on their back order list for months. Yesterday I called Sig customer service (30 seconds on hold), spoke to a native New Hampshire man who spoke perfect English and while he said officially the part is on B/O and not being sold currently due to short supply, he would take my order anyway and send me one. Now THAT'S Customer Service!!!!! :)

Rant over. Now I feel better! :p
Click to expand...
 
Hey at 75 I'm far from a millennial and for many years I have been pondering what it says in your thread title. For the most part costumer service is just a fallacy from the good old days!

To be truthful ever now and then you do find a little, it does sort of keep you guessing!:rolleyes:
 
So many companies cannot afford nor can they hire people in the USA to handle call centers. Therefore like in production they go overseas for employment. Also think about what time it is in the Philippines or in India when you are calling during the day here, it is in the middle of the night there. It's all about overhead costs which have a major affect on profits or losses...Of course customer service is very important but you tell me why would you do if having a local call center meant the difference to your bottom line?
 
I been having a couple real problems of late. My new cell phone keeps reprogramming it's self and after no less than 5 hours on the phone with Verizon they said they would send me a new one to replace my two week old phone. When I got the new phone it was not new it was a reconditioned phone. So after another 3 hours on the phone and a call to our states Attorney General's office they are having a brand new phone delivered today. When ever I would call and get some one that could not speak English just by asking the would switch me to someone in the states.
While this was going on they changed my cell connection box on our ADT security system to a 5G system. No charge and no hassle scheduling an appointment. Now this new call box is having problems and I have called ADT a number of times to get things working right. Never more than a 2 minute wait, all service center are in the USA, and everyone is working to get it fixed. After yesterdays call I got a call back and they will be here today at noon to replace our entire system and we get a couple months free for the inconvenience. Customer service is very important to ADT.
 
Ziggy2525 said:
I think it's humorous when you end up in an Indian call center and the CS rep answers the phone with a strong Hindi accent "Hello, my name is Bob" or "Hello, my name is Sara." The first thing that pops into my mind is "No it's not."
Click to expand...
Or, when they see you are calling from Texas it's: "Hello, this is Beeley Bhab", hoho
 
I go out of my way to purchase goods and services designed and produced in the USA and who service their customers with USA based CS teams. Unfortunately, there are some (probably most) services and products where it is just impossible to do so. So here we are........
 
I've worked for a large, well known, world wide technology company with local offices across the US. The company started as a employee and customer centric technology and service provider with the culture that if the company takes very good care of their employees, the employees in turn will take very good care of the customers. This business philosophy, along with good products, served the company well for decades with very little employee turnover and a large repeat customer base.

Unfortunately, in 2015 it merged with another large stock traded company. After the business integration the first thing that happened was the local phone systems with local receptionist (who knew many customers by name and voice recognition) was discarded for a voice over IP system that was centrally answered in Colorado. That immediately killed the relationships with many local offices with their local customers, but it did save some money when they terminated around 200 receptionist.

Next thing they did was move their accounts payable and accounts receivable operations overseas to India. Yep, once again a number of English speaking Americans who have direct contact with English speaking American customers were terminated and the responsibilities out sourced to semi-English speaking "customer care representatives".

Finally, they disbanded the service dispatchers that were located regionally across the US and moved operations to Monterey, Mexico. These are the up front folks who interact with our valued customers who have service issues and these representatives either try to talk a customer through any minor difficulties on the phone, or dispatch a technician to the location to effect repair. Again, communications skills are paramount, but the folks in Monterey will work much cheaper than American labor. Personally, I found I could understand the English speaking Mexicans better than the English speaking Indians, but the interaction between both is still challenging due to language barriers.

Employees are no longer the focus of the company, and customers do not like working with off shore sub-contractors. What I'm seeing is that customers are leaving in droves and choosing to work with local service providers rather than a nationwide company with off shore support.

I'm not really seeing this as a millennial issue.
 
Last edited:
I'm losing parts of the full range of hearing due to age. I've found I can understand females (no matter their country of origin or accent) far better than males on phone assist calls. I hate calls I have to make on anything tech because there's three or four levels of expertise you have to wade through to get to your solution.
 
I gave up on phone customer service long ago. Fortunately, computer chat service has been improving, and I can almost always resolve any difficulty in a few minutes now.
 
The last time I called Ruger Customer Service, about 6 months ago, I got a really nice Lady on the phone. She was very knowledgeable, and spoke clearly and was easy to understand. She was able to help me solve my problem quickly and at no charge. What a nice breath of fresh air.

Have a blessed day,

Leon
 
I bought an inexpensive plastic assemble your self shelving unit at Lowes.
When I assembled it I was short 1 leg. The label on the unit said to contact them direct if an issue.
I called and a nice young lady took my complaint and advised a leg would be shipped. Next day got UPS tracking number.
This is how customer service should work.
 
To be fair to Amazon, they do not question returns and they pay the return shipping. They make a return label available to print. A private carrier picks up the return package off my porch. I never even thought of calling them.

I'm curious. What product problem could be fixed by talking to customer service?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

chief38
My newly nominated "Worst Company" for customer service
2
Replies
26
Views
2K
Rustyt1953
Rustyt1953
O
Great Customer Service, Robertson Trading Post
Replies
0
Views
346
otis24
O
V
Tool that Works as Advertised-Reccomend
Replies
12
Views
526
tlawler
tlawler
chief38
UPDATED 04/01 Give credit to a Company that WELL deserves it!
Replies
10
Views
1K
quikdraw67
quikdraw67
NYlakesider
phone fun
Replies
6
Views
724
NYlakesider
NYlakesider

Latest posts

Back
Top