Customer Service Gone Right

Most of the time when you call customer service, things go horribly wrong.  You're on hold for a bazillion years; there's some sort of phone system that leads you in a never-ending loop or automatically hangs up on you; or, my personal favorite, you speak to a series of people who have no idea what you're talking about no matter how often you ask to talk with a manager.

Recently, I have had two customer service experiences that have defied all expectations and have actually served me, the customer, in a positive and helpful way.  

The first one happened when I was trying to resolve a prenatal charge from back in June of last year, when we were still living in Illinois.  We had a fetal echocardiogram done to make sure that the tiny human, known at that point as Embry, didn't have any heart issues that we should be aware of.  The claim was submitted to our insurance, which promptly denied the claim.  They sent it up the chain at insurance for review, but to no avail.  They kept telling me it was a routine procedure (um, very much no) that they would not cover.  Well, as happens in these cases, I got a final bill from Carle telling me that I needed to pay them or I would be in trouble.  I called Carle and thought I was going to have the usual awful phone experience where nobody helped me and I just got more and more frustrated and angry.  

To my pleasant surprise, I wound up talking to a manager in Carle's Maternal and Fetal Medicine department within just a few minutes.  This woman was a customer service goldmine.  Not only did she listen to me and actually understand my problem, she then told me she would call our insurance company directly and give me a call back to let me know how things went.  I was a little worried at this point, because usually "I'll call you back later" means "You will never hear from me again and I won't even note in the system that you called."  This amazing woman not only called our insurance company, explained the problem to them, and immediately faxed them some documents to support our claim that the service should be covered, she then actually called me back.  She explained what the holdup was on the insurance company's end (they didn't know I was pregnant, because "fetal echocardiogram" doesn't indicate pregnant...?), told me what she had done, and asked me if I had any questions or if there was anything else she could do.  Seriously, I was blown away.  

My second bit of awesome customer service relates to our stroller.  So I went a bit extreme on the stroller I wanted.  It's this amazing (and, unfortunately, expensive) jogging stroller that totally rocks.  It's aggressive.  It will roll over anything.  It rides super smoothly.  It has decent storage space.  I love it.  Unfortunately, the same stupid plant caltrops - goat's head thorns, which I now hate with the passion of a thousand burning suns - that ate my feet a few weeks ago have also destroyed the stroller's front tire.  It wouldn't hold air and I really didn't want to have to pay the rather large sum to have new tubes and tires sent to me.  So I called customer service. 

I couldn't get through the first couple of tries, so I was starting to get worried, but eventually I got hold of an awesome person who helped with everything.  He apologized profusely about my not being able to get through and explained that they were celebrating a co-worker's birthday, so folks were eating cake and bagels when they normally opened the lines.  But, he then indicated that he would send me a free replacement tube for the front stroller wheel even though tubes and tires aren't normally covered under the warranty.  Which is awesome, because I kind of live by that stroller.  Recently, I've been using our Baby Bjorn to take the tiny human on walks, but the longer the walk the more intensely angry my back is at me when we get home.  

Soon, I shall once again be the proud owner of a usable and intensely awesome baby jogger!!!  

Customer service should be so simple.  I should call a place, talk to a person, and get my problem fixed.  If they can't fix my problem, they should apologize profusely, explain why, and patiently allow me to snidely berate their company.  Okay, that last bit is a bit jerky, but that's one of the services offered by customer service:  client venting.  The two folks above are amazingly awesome, and I am planning on sending them cards.  Seriously, it makes absolutely everything so much better when you can talk to a person and get the help you need.

So, my friends, may all your calls to customer support be as helpful and non-frustrating as these two were for me.  Take care, and I'll write again soon!