05 June 2014

Adventures in useless customer service; or, why I use UPS now

A transcript of my recent emails with FedEx:

Me:
I am very angry. I am going to try very hard not to be rude in this message, because I know that you, the person reading this, are not personally responsible for making me angry. But I am very angry.

Several days ago, I came home to a door tag saying a delivery had been attempted but no one was home. The signature line was voided. "Fine," I thought, "It says another attempt will be made, but since I'm not home during the day, I'll log on to the site and tell them to hold the package." The next day, I log on to the site and tell you to hold the package. Or at least I try to. Your doortag claims that the site will allow that, but in fact when I created an account and attempted to tell you to hold the package, that option was grayed out, and when I tried to save my changes the site just said "Thanks, delivery will be reattempted." So a couple days later I come home to a new door tag, because sure enough you tried to deliver the package again. Fair enough, not the delivery person's
fault. The doortag again says another attempt will be made.

No further doortags. I waited, assuming there would be a last one, after which you would hold the shipment for some amount of time and I'd have a chance to find it and get it. Still no doortag. So now today I log on and find out that with NO FINAL ATTEMPT AT DELIVERY you have decided that the delivery has failed, and never having given me the option to pick up my package, you have no choice but to return to sender.

I am very angry.
FedEx:
Thank you for your email. We regret any inconvenience you experienced with this shipment.
According to our records, the package is on a return-to-shipper status. As the package is already in transit back to the sender, please contact your shipper to make arrangements should you need the package re-shipped to you.
We appreciate your patience on this matter, and thank you for shipping with FedEx.
Me:
Yes, thank you, I am aware it is being returned, that is what I am upset about. I have been in touch with the sender and he will re-ship once the package returns to him. What reference number should I give him to ensure he is not charged a second time for shipping given that the failure to deliver was declared even though no final attempt was made?
FedEx:
Thank you for contacting FedEx. We regret any inconvenience.
According to our records, this shipment was returned to the sender on June 5, 2014, at 8:37 AM, and was signed for by [redacted]. With regard to your billing inquiry, kindly contact our Revenue Services department at 800-622-1147 for assistance. Their hours of operation are 7:00 AM - 8:00 PM Central Time, Monday to Friday, and from 7:00 AM - 6:00 PM Central Time on Saturday.
Me:
June 5th. 2pm. This will likely be my last communication.
I tried. Oh, how I tried. I told them. I told them what was wrong. They said to call someone else. I told them again. Same non-response. WHY WON'T THEY LISTEN? Now it's getting closer. I may get this email out. There won't be time for more. No more emails. No more FedEx packages. Ever. May god save us all. If only they had listened. They could have fixed it. Ended this. But they didn't. And now...oh no, it heard me typing. It's comi[MESSAGE ENDS]

I worked very hard on that first email. It went through several drafts, over the course of which the curse words and recriminations were mostly culled, though apparently I still couldn't restrain myself from a bit of caps lock.

The last email was much easier to write, knowing that the customer support agents are either incapable of providing helpful responses or are simply not allowed to.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

You should go back on the stage or, at least, the radio .