ericcoleman | The Foreman Awards For Excellence In Humanity - Customer Relations

These are both things that happened to me this week. Of course it is not the first time for either but who cares ...

And The Beep Goes On.

I was getting gas in a small Iowa town near the small Iowa town I live in. I filled my tank and was about to head into the store to pay. The gas pump proceeded to beep at me, and beep at me, and beep at me, and beep at me. It beeped as I walked all the way across the parking lot into the store. It was still beeping as I entered the store. Now keep in mind that this is a small town. This is not some high traffic gas station. My question is, does this actually do any good? Do they really think I need that reminder? Am I going to forget that I need to pay for my gas and therefore need this obnoxious reminder? If I indeed planned on driving away, will this beep make me see the error of my ways and forever more pay the money I owe with a smile on my face and a bank loan to cover it? Or is it just rude and terrible customer relations?

YOU DO WANT FRIES WITH THAT !!!

I hate the force sales thing. It pisses me off generally. I make a point of always saying "that's all" when I order fast food. Most folks get it. I had someone argue with me last week. They would not take no for an answer that I only wanted a burger and fries, no drink. They kept on how it would save me money. You know, by spending 50 cents more on the drink that I didn’t want I would spend less than if I had bought the drink separately. I told them that I didn't like Coke and didn't want a Coke, so they tried to get me to get a milkshake. Do they expect to keep customers? I asked to speak to the manager when I drove around. Sure enough, she was the one who I had been speaking to.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

You do want fries with that.

Bad bad bad bad bad bad bad!!

NO COOKIE FOR THEM!!

So bad for customer relations!!! You offer once... and ONLY once. No heckling or prodding to get a decision!! *pant pant pant*

Hell, when I worked in the food business that was what we were trained to do. Only ask to make it a combo once, and only ask to biggie size once. More than that and you're beating a dead horse.

*takes all the cookies*

Given the fairly poor track record of my preferences winning the weekly poll, I guess I need to start campaigning.

As passionately as I hate gratuituous beeping, I can't tell from your description if the behavior you describe is part of the designed operation of the machine, caused because the machine is broken, or because of some exceptional condition you weren't aware of. The designer only deserves honors in the first case. If the machine is broken, the manager of the gas station only deserves honors if it's been going on long enough that he could have fixed it but hasn't bothered.

On the other hand, fast food sellers who won't listen to the customers should take up new careers as fertilizer. If they're otherwise well behaved they might be highly evolved enough to aspire to cat food.

And one final shot -- the idea that paying less money than the "regular price" for something you wouldn't have bought in the first place constitutes saving money deserves a society wide special award.

It is designed to do that. So you don't forget. I wasn't the first person to complain about it, but the woman did say I was the funniest

The worst part of the "you want fries" problem is that some VP of marketing made it mandatory to ask and no-one in the food chain is allowed to use any common sense when asking. My 2 favorites are;

Went to toys R Us, bought 1 Hot Wheel car. The poor kid *had* to ask me if I wanted batteries with that or else my purchase was free.

Burger King has/had an Atkins friendly menu. One of the items was the lo-carb (read bunless) burger. I placed my order and the kid asked if I wanted fries with that.

Though even though I'm diabetic, sometimes I do want fries with that. What I don't like is that the choices are often between extremes...all carbs or no carbs, and dammit, I need some carbs.

On the "You want Fries with that front" I was driving down I-95 in South Carolina, and there was a billboard for a $1.99 breakfast sandwich at Burger King. Egg, Cheese, Bacon, on a bagel. Okay, breakfast. Except I don't like bacon. So I go an order the special with out the bacon. They try to charge me $2.75. Why? I ask. The special includes bacon... you're not getting the bacon therefore not getting the special. I tell them they can keep the bacon and sell it to someone else at a loss they say nope... can't deviate. So I order the special, get my sandwich and promptly remove my bacon from the sandwich and slap it down on the counter and walk away.

Atkins with fries...{shakes head}

absolutively the plus selling BULLDADA

And much as i loved the suggestion about fertilzer aspiring to cat food, yea the sad truth is they're cowed into plus selling. i mean, think about it. the utter shame and humiliation of being FIRED from a minimum wage retail or food service job... i remember when the Amocos started turning into BPs. (Wasn't all that long ago really). Remember? all shiny bright and new, with lots of lights, clever use of color, doors that are honored to open before you and pleased to close behind you, satisfied in a job well-done? the well-trained goon-squad behind the counter plus-selling the shit out of everything with the thinly-veiled-behind-a-chipper-smile look of abject terror on their shiny scrubbed faces ?

creeped me out so bad i avoided BP for a good year or 2 till the hype finally died down and they started acting like a gas station again..

as for beeping (BPing? ;-) ) gas pumps...annoying. the programmer needs a good thwack upon the forehead with a coiled-up middle finger. but it's mere mechanical repetition. not insiduouscorporate brainwashing.

"And then?"

"No and then!"

"And then?!"

"No! No and then!!"

count your blessings, at least the manager spoke English fluently enough TO push the damn coke. None of the fast food places near me have even THAT good of a customer service level.

And I live less than 5 miles from the worldwide headquarters of McDonalds.

The Foreman Awards For Excellence In Humanity - Customer Relations - 05/02/05

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

OY!

no subject

no subject