Although millions of people are
hooked to online stores, I was rather skeptical about
their credibility. I didn’t want to buy something which I could not touch
and carry back home with me after swiping my credit card. However, I’d always wanted
to buy my husband an exclusive watch and had run out of options at the local
malls.
Another birthday was
approaching and I was steadily running short of time without being able to
identify the right timepiece. My friend suggested an online store - I could not
help but jump on the bandwagon and place an order after identifying the perfect
antique replica with an artificial crocodile leather strap and black dial. I
was a bit paranoid the watch might not look as attractive in real life as in
the website image and carefully read comments posted by other customers. Eventually,
I felt confident enough to place an order and typed the message I’d wanted them
to engrave on the watch. I received a phone call from their verification
department in a couple of minutes to confirm my order and was informed the
watch would be delivered within 5 working days.
Four days later, a Friday, the
watch arrived. I was thrilled by their promptness and glad to see the watch looked
better in reality than its photograph. I flipped it over to read the
personalized message, my jaw dropped – my husband’s name, the personalized
message and my name were all incorrect! It wasn’t for our Anniversary and his
name was not ‘KC’! Cursing, I dialed their customer service toll free number,
which sounded its incessant beeping and irritating pre-recorded “You are a
valued customer. Your call is important to us, please hold the line..” message
which didn’t alleviate my stress levels. Finally, a customer representative
came online and I fumed about the goof up and shouted out that his Birthday was
in a couple of days! She responded politely all through my ranting, which
actually helped calm me a bit and assured me an employee would phone me within
a few hours.
Forty five minutes later, a soft
spoken person informed me that the issue would be resolved in a couple of days,
I inquired if he meant “working days” or “days” since the birthday was on Monday?
The next afternoon, a Saturday,
I received another call from someone in the company who introduced himself as
the ‘store manager’. He apologized and assured me that my watch would be delivered
by Monday. However, I informed him about the importance of it being delivered
before - it was my husband’s birthday gift and was told they would prioritize
my delivery.
Sunday evening, my watch
reached me – I was surprised, thrilled and relieved – the thought of wishing my
husband empty handed had been horrific! The delivery boy dialed a number on his
phone and handed it to me, the person on the other end was their store manager asking
if the watch was exactly as per my instructions. I handed over the previous
delivery to their employee and thanked the manager for keeping with his
commitment and understanding the importance of this gift for my husband. He mentioned
that there were multiple departments involved with capturing, preparing and delivering
their orders – IT, call center, warehouse and the delivery team. Often, there
would be lapses in sharing information related to customers without a common
system, also, often managers could not pinpoint where an issue originated. Their
legacy system had been implemented to simply capture details of orders, the
rest was handled through assorted software programs and rough notes scribbled
on paper!
My husband was pleasantly
surprised by the gift, he appreciated my thoughtfulness but was unaware of its
history! I received a parcel from the company a month later, a day before my
birthday - the same watch in a ladies size with a birthday card and message which
read “We apologize for almost ruining your husband’s birthday surprise,
hopefully this will partly make up for it”. I smiled and felt my customer experience wasn't so bad after all!
The next time I called them to
order a cuckoo clock a year later, they had all my details at their fingertips,
“Good afternoon, ma’am! Are you calling to order a gift for your husband’s
birthday next week?” the agent asked.
“Uh..Yes..” I said, a little
startled and asked “How did you know?”
“We ensure you there will be no mix-up with the delivery this time! We have imported customer
information from previous interactions into our new CRM software – it displays
all the important dates and order related activities”, he responded. “I also
see that you live near the Metro Mall, we have recently opened a new outlet there - may I
SMS its address?” he continued.
“OK” I responded, happy to shop
with them, “Do you stock chiming clocks too?”
