Worst customer service you've ever had (rant happy)

[Jamieson 90]

When a loved one dies you have the unfortunate business of notifying all the relevant companies and authorities of the death. I must have phoned about 30 different organisations when my mother sadly passed away. The majority, probably 98% were absolutely great but there was one call that really fucked me off. The woman was arsey from the get go, insensitive, gave off the impression she didn't want to deal with the call and used language like "Right I've deleted her from the system," not even a condolence or I'm sorry for your loss.

The bit that really got me was when she went quiet after saying that. I was like "Well do you want any of the documentation then?" To which she replied. "You can if you want to," she couldn't have sounded any less arsed if she'd have tried, and here I was phoning them up to help them, it's not like I had to ring them up or anything. I was fucking fuming.

 

[Riotguards]

All right so it looks like my poor understanding of amazon rating conventions was indeed a factor, as I feared. Nevertheless I would then argue the amazon rating conventions are just as inflated as those for videogame reviews. 5 Stars I would only give if everything came exactly as promised, along with a free keychain or something. So a 4/5 after it was late, the (suspected) lies about the postal service and the fact they didn't even know until I contacted them? Sorry, no.

well you're right and i agree that maybe 4/5 stars is being generous but if they didn't lie (assuming they did) and then give you a salty message they deserved a 3/5 stars

if they handled it far better people are more willing to give 4/5 - 5/5 because you handled the situation with the customer in mind and as a result of that the customer feels compelled to think of it less negatively (which results in better stars)

regardless you should put it back because they gave you such a nasty letter from them

 

[Vausch]

I ordered a wacom cintiq from macmall and had it shipped through this third party whose name escapes me.

Basically the shipment was taking longer than expected, so I called the shipping company. They said they'd look and see if it was in my city, but they forgot to turn off the speaker. I could overhear someone in the back going "What is with these idiots, always calling up going 'Where's my shit, where's my shit?'. They can use the online tracker, morons."[footnote lable=1]For the record, their shipping tracker required signing up on their site and basically get on their mailing list. Didn't want that.[/footnote]

*they pick up the phone*

"(what'stheirname) shipping, how can I help you?"

Me: Hi, I wanted to know where my shit was.

 

[Verlander]

Apple Store, Regent Street, London.

Considering how many "Geniuses" they have walking about the place (easily 50+ employees on the floor), none of them seemed to know the first thing about their products, and that was after having to physically get the attention of one of them. Being ignored isn't the word!

 

[Battenberg]

I ordered something from Zoverstocks through Play a while back and they sent me the wrong thing. It was similar to what I ordered but ultimately still not what I had paid for so I sent them a simple message about this and asked how to go about returning it through Play (as it was quite large and I had no intention of paying the return postage for their mistake). Then a week later I emailed them directly. Then a week later I sent a message through both Play and emailing them directly. 5 days after that I got my first reply from them which explained the basic returns procedure, which I already knew, but didn't answer my question about postage (which I had asked 4 times by this point). SO I tried to contact them again and again over the next 2 weeks, again not getting any replies. Eventually I got fed up and went directly to Play and made it their problem, making it clear that I'd had enough and if they couldn't resolve the issue I'd be looking into more serious action. It still took another few days to arrange returning it directly to Play and a week or so after that before I had my money back.

The kicker was that doing this essentially put a black mark against my account with Play. Turns out if you get screwed over to the point you have to contact them directly they make a note of it with a '3 strikes and you're out' system. So if you do get screwed over 3 times through their site they just straight up close your account and ban you from buying from them, even if all 3 claims were perfectly legitimate.

 

[MetalDooley]

SKY Television(the largest supplier of subscription satellite tv in the UK and Ireland if you're unfamiliar with them)

Going back a few years now but my father wanted to sign up for their service so he got me to look it up.His one caveat was that direct debit had to be optional as he doesn't like paying for things that way.So I check their website and there in black and white in the FAQ section is "you are not obliged to pay by direct debit".Great so I signed up to avail of the special offer they had going which was free sports and movies channels for the first 2 months for signing up online.24 hours later I get a call to confirm my application.The woman asks me if I wish to pay by direct debit and I say no."No problem" I'm told "a crew will be out in the next couple of days to install the service".Sure enough about 3 days later 2 guys come to our house install the service and everything is hunky dory...

..for about 2 weeks at least.Almost exactly 2 weeks after installation I get up one morning to discover that 90% of the channels are cut off and sitting in the post is a direct debit form.I contact Sky customer service and am told that the channels are cut off because they still haven't received my direct debit details.I remind them that I'm not paying by DD and am told it's a mistake on their behalf that will be rectified shortly.Sure enough within 20 mins my service is restored.Everthings back to normal right?

Wrong.This shit happened like clockwork.Every 2 weeks we would receive a DD form in the post and our service was cut off.And everytime I contacted customer service I was fed some new lie.I was told we were contractually obliged to pay by DD.When I asked the girl to point out exactly where in the contract this was(hint:it isn't.I read the contract cover to cover)she tried to change the subject.When I pointed out what it says on their website I was told "oh the website has nothing to do with us".You're the same company FFS or course it has to do with ye.I was told that we were obliged to pay by DD for at least the first 6 weeks.I was told that if we didn't use DD then we had to pay the first 6 months in advance.I was told that if we didn't use DD then we had to pay the first 12 months in advance.I was told that if we didn't use DD then we didn't qualify for the free sports and movies offer and would be charged for them.All complete bullshit to try and bully us into paying by direct debit

After putting up with this bullshit for a few months I eventually got sick of it and stopped contacting them.I have to laugh every time I see one of their ads with their "Believe in Better" slogan.SKY can officially go fuck themselves

 

[Zhadramekel]

I used to work at my local Sainsbury's supermarket and made some friends while working there, one of whom was kind of a jerk but I got along with him anyway. Long story short, I left to go to university but would always go in when I was home for breaks. I would sometimes stop to talk to this guy when I was shopping if he wasn't busy. Post graduation, I re-applied to the shop to work on the deli counter and told this person about it. He said to me: "if you get the job, you'll end up eating everything behind the counter".

We're no longer friends.

 

[MysticSlayer]

I've had a few questions that I've asked Steam Support and never got a response for. I think that might count as the worst considering they didn't even bother to try.

I've also had multiple times where someone didn't even understand their own product. I was one time trying to fix a computer and was trying to ask the company that built it about the problem. They didn't even know which wires went where in the computer and basically left me with a 50/50 chance of fixing the problem or creating an even worse one.

There was also the time that I contacted a company to ask a question only to be sent to a different department only for them to send my call to a third department only for that third department to send my call to the one that I originally contact. It actually is sort of funny now that I look back on it.

But probably one of the most damaging to me was at my former college's bookstore. They were supposed to send an e-mail to alert me that I had received the books that I had ordered. As a result, I decided to pick the books up the day before classes and wait until mine got in and just return them. Conveniently, it took them until the day after I could get my refund to e-mail me (did I mention that my order started getting process the first day anyone's in the college possibly could?). Oh, but it gets better! When I made my disappointment clear, they acted like they were giving me a refund (i.e. gave me some cash) and sent me to the office to finalize the transaction. I instantly knew that there was a problem, though, when the office said that they weren't actually able to do anything and that they had no idea why the bookstore kept sending people like me over to them (yes, I wasn't the only one facing this problem). I later found out that, despite giving me some cash to shut me up, the bookstore ended up charging my financial aid the amount that they gave me in cash. The end result was that I still ended up paying them for the books! And you want to know what the college did about this problem that, as I already said, was something multiple students dealt with and the office clearly knew about? Nothing!