Ding! Ding! Customer Service, Please!

I’m not even sure where to begin.  Lately, it seems like life at our house has been one long story after another.  Our kitchen stove that was purchased in February hasn’t worked in a month (long story).  My beloved 2007 Tahoe didn’t pass inspection (long and ongoing story) and the sale of a rental property required the rescheduling of the closing date five times (long wait AND a long story).  Apparently, the sixth time's the charm.  Plus, we’re in the final countdown to our son’s wedding which is adding an additional layer of complexity to our lives right now.  Joyful complexity, but complexity nonetheless.  So, it’s not that I haven’t wanted to blog; I just haven’t been able to scrape together enough minutes to do it.

I’m taking a brief break from the series documenting our 2017 West Coast National Parks trip.  Why?  Because I’ve been spittin’ sparks over a couple of really poor customer service incidents.  I feel the need to vent about those and recognize some wonderful individuals who truly know the meaning of good customer service.  The photos in this post are from a recent two week trip to the coast of South Carolina, central North Carolina and the mountains of Virginia.  I’m hoping a few relaxing nature photographs might calm me down after my exasperating experiences.

Alan and I have always been sticklers for good customer service.  In fact, there are few things that push our buttons faster than being on the receiving end of poor service or having to spend hours of our time trying to rectify mistakes others have made.  We’re always happy to reward companies whose management and staff understand the importance of excellent customer service by patronizing those businesses, and we’re quick to praise the efforts of individuals or corporations that rise to the challenge of truly serving their customers.  While customer service might not be typical fodder for a post here on Reflections Around the Campfire, it has certainly been the topic of more than one conversation around the campfire.  Over the past few months, we’ve endured some pretty awful customer service.  But, we’ve been the recipients of some really terrific service, too.

Shenandoah National Park ~ Virginia

Just this past week alone, I’ve been annoyed by the time I wasted entering the exact same information on three different web pages of a state agency, all to complete one specific chore.  I’ve been disgusted with the shortcomings of another government agency that ended up requiring a total of four trips to the motor vehicle department to register a vehicle.  And then there's the federal agency whose local office never returned my call and whose national office disconnected me after I waited on hold for a customer service representative for forty minutes.  As Lenny Briscoe, Jerry Orbach’s character on Law & Order, would say, “That’s forty minutes of my life I’ll never get back.”

Huntington Beach State Park ~ South Carolina

After a recent discussion about customer service (or lack thereof) with Alan, we’ve come to the conclusion that we’ve really been fortunate in some of our business and personal dealings.  Alan recalled a staff member in a Texas Roadhouse restaurant in Rhode Island who provided us with such delightful service that we asked to speak to her manager before we left the restaurant.  Regular readers know that I often applaud the excellent service we’ve always received from the staff at Outdoors RV Manufacturing, the small company in eastern Oregon that produced our amazing travel trailer.  Because we find it sad that excellent customer service seems to be so hard to come by these days, I’d like to highlight a few wonderful examples we’ve recently enjoyed that involved one diligent staff member of a huge corporation, a unique and entertaining restaurant experience and the charm of small town businesses.

Shenandoah River State Park ~ Virginia

Back in February, we ordered a set of French doors for our living room and another exterior door for our laundry room from Home Depot.  Brandon, the young man who assisted us and ordered our doors, could have taught a course on customer service to many people two or three times his age.  When I say young, I mean twenty-something.  I could use a lot of adjectives to describe Brandon, but I think if I say friendly, professional, efficient and diligent you’ll get the picture.  Additionally, he looked us in the eye when he spoke to us, carried on an intelligent conversation, called or emailed us when he said he was going to and was exceptionally polite about it when he did it.  (No, you can’t have him; we’re keeping him.)  When the fourteen week waiting period we had anticipated passed, I contacted Brandon to see if he had heard anything about our doors.  Instead of saying no, they’re not in yet, he took the initiative to find out what was causing the delay and determine the new expected arrival date, assuring us he’d keep an eye out for them.  Imagine that – a person who not only does his job, but takes pride in doing it well.  What a concept!  During our first encounter with Brandon, I noticed that the coffee cup on his desk was from a regional convenience store chain in our area, so Alan and I dropped off a gift card to that establishment to Brandon one day, suggesting that he buy a couple of coffees on us.  I emailed the store manager about our experience with Brandon, too.  Excellent service seems to be such a rarity in today’s society, that Alan and I do our best to applaud those who are seriously committed to delivering it, whether in the form of a smile and a sincere thank you, a small gift or a conversation with a manager.  We know how good those pats on the back feel when our own efforts are recognized and appreciated, so we try to be mindful of the dedication of others to a job well done.

Huntington Beach State Park ~ South Carolina

I will confess that I’m addicted to the Chicken and Dumplings offered at Cracker Barrel restaurants.  (Apparently, I’m also addicted to Krispy Kreme’s raspberry-filled doughnuts, but that story of discovery will have to wait for another post.)  Since we don’t have a Cracker Barrel near where we live, we often stop at one while traveling so that I can indulge my taste buds and assuage my craving.  Late last summer, we stopped at a Cracker Barrel about an hour and a half from our home.  Our server, Julia, was delightful.  Known for his good sense of humor, Alan started joking with her almost immediately, and she started teasing him right back.  By the end of our lunch, Julia was begging me to be sure I took him with me when I left.  Alan, of course, thought all of this was hysterically funny.  When it came time to pay the cashier, I used up three gift cards with miscellaneous balances that I’d been holding in my wallet for a while.  The cashier instructed me where to add the tip which, in this case, was a generous one.  That night, when I was logging in the day’s travel receipts and we were far, far away from that Cracker Barrel, I realized that Julia’s tip was never actually charged to any of the gift cards.  The wonderful server who had provided us with the best entertainment of the day ended up with a big fat zero for a tip.  We felt AWFUL!  Luckily, we always travel with some blank note cards and stamps, so I wrote a note of explanation to poor Julia, dropped a $10 bill in the notecard and addressed it to “Julia, Server # . . .” at the Cracker Barrel address on the receipt.  When we arrived home about five weeks later, there was a card in our mail from someone whose name we didn’t recognize.  It was a thank you from Julia, who must have spent half of her tip on a lovely Hallmark card to acknowledge that she had received our note and tip.  We were both quite surprised and very touched.  Sweet Julia ended up impressing us not once but twice.  As Paul Harvey would have said, “Now for the rest of the story . . . “

Shenandoah National Park ~ Virginia

Maybe a month or so ago, Alan and I found ourselves in the vicinity of Julia’s Cracker Barrel again.  We went in for lunch and asked if she happened to be working that day.  She was!  So, we asked to be seated at one of her tables.  Well, let me tell you, it was like a reunion of long-lost friends.  Come to find out, the reason Julia had jumped on the Humor Bandwagon during our last trip was because she had previously worked at a Dick’s Last Resort restaurant.  Suddenly, all the teasing going on between Julia and Alan made sense.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with the ambience at Dick’s Last Resort, the entire purpose of having a meal there is to torment the wait staff so they’ll torment you back.  (A server at one Dick’s location created a paper dunce cap for me with the word “Difficult” on it.  Just sayin’ . . . )  Once Julia knew we were experienced patrons of Dick’s Last Resort, she gave Alan even more grief and we all had a good laugh.  Yes, you can bet that we’ll be asking for one of Julia’s tables the next time we visit that Cracker Barrel.

Huntington Beach State Park ~ South Carolina

I know this is a long post and you probably need a bathroom break about now, but please hang in there for one last story.  Do you remember, earlier in the post, I mentioned that my Tahoe didn’t pass inspection?  Well, it may be able to be repaired, but we’re waiting for a certified welder to take a look at it before we make that determination.  Meanwhile, Alan and I had agreed that, even if it was repairable, it was probably time to start looking for a replacement for my 15 year old vehicle.  So, while in the midst of final wedding preparations and trying to close on the sale of our rental property, we added vehicle shopping to the chaos that was our life a few weeks ago.

Shenandoah River State Park ~ Virginia

Alan and I like GM vehicles and have had excellent luck with all but that one GMC Sierra pickup truck whose transmission failed at the beginning of our West Coast National Parks trip.  So, we had targeted some GM SUVs that were a bit smaller than my current Chevy Tahoe.  Since we now had the pickup truck, we didn’t really need my personal vehicle to be a tow vehicle.  That opened up the number of possibilities but, because of the area in which we live, I still needed either all-wheel drive or four-wheel drive.  And I preferred a vehicle manufactured before the arrival of the chip shortage, so I was looking at a 2019 or 2020 model year.  After comparing the prices of new SUVs to used ones that all seemed to have between 30,000 and 60,000 miles on them, Alan thought it might be worthwhile to pay a little more for a new one and start with a blank mileage slate.  One of our shopping stops was at the GMC dealership that arranged the purchase of our current pickup truck over the phone for us (in the course of one seven-hour day business day) on that West Coast trip a few years back.  This small dealership was passed down from the original owner to his two sons.  Well, now the third generation is on the scene in the form of the original owner’s grandson, Gregory.  Greg happened to be in charge of the Sales Department at the time of our visit since his parents were out of town attending his sister’s graduation.  Alan and I had met Greg in the past and he immediately remembered us, citing the truck “Buy by Phone” incident.  Alan and I were there to test drive a GMC Acadia and possibly a GMC Terrain – which we did – and we both liked the Acadia.  Nothing on the lot (remember, small dealership) met our complete list of wants and needs, so we resigned ourselves to potentially ordering one and waiting three to four months.  Yes, it would be delivered with two missing chips and the vehicle would have to be retrofitted when the parts became available.

Huntington Beach State Park ~ South Carolina

While we were discussing the Acadia, somehow the conversation turned to the two used Chevy Tahoes Greg had on the lot.  One had bucket seats in the second row (not my personal cup of tea) and was in a color I didn’t like.  The other Tahoe, well . . . Did you hear that tiny thumping sound?  It was the pitter patter of my little heart when it caught sight of the other Tahoe.  The attraction turned to lust and longing when we found out it was a 2020 that had only 16,000 miles on it.  And guess what.  It had a second row bench seat, four-wheel drive and was in a color I actually liked.  So, you’re wondering where the customer service part of the story comes in, right?  Here it is: We had just started shopping around and we really weren’t prepared to buy a vehicle that day.  On a handshake deal with absolutely no paperwork signed, Greg put a sold sign on the 2020 Tahoe after we told him we’d have to go home and move some money around.  I called him the next day to let him know that the funds I moved weren’t going to be available to draw on for a full week, and I asked him if he wanted my credit card info over the phone to process a deposit.  I also offered to drive a deposit out to him if he preferred a check.  Greg said no worries, no deposit needed, just get the insurance info to him and he’d have the Tahoe all set to go at the end of the following week.  No, he didn’t need a bank check; a personal check would be fine.  Still no paperwork, just a whole lot of excellent customer service delivered with a small town attitude.

Shenandoah National Park ~ Virginia

As annoying as it is to be on the receiving end of poor customer service, it’s always a pleasure to recognize the amazing individuals who do it up right.  So, to all of the Brandons, Julias and Gregorys of the world . . . A round of applause and a heartfelt THANK YOU! for going that extra mile on behalf of your customers.  Your efforts are very much appreciated!