Well, maybe it does want to keep me, although that isn’t clear.

I went to the website to check options because I had been thinking of getting a competitor’s paper on just one day. Did it make sense to stop the other paper for that day or just leave the suscription as it was? While checking prices, I discovered that new subscribers — not yet VALUED subscribers — could get the paper for half price for six months.

I called to ask politely why VALUED subscribers weren’t offered a similar deal. Eventually I was able to get  half price for four months if I paid with automatic monthly billing. But why did I have to ask?

Meanwhile, I’ve let a magazine subscription lapse, although I’m wavering. To encourage me to renew, the magazine just sent me a promise to send me a free cookbook as part of the Special Renewal Savings Rate.

If we as subscribers and customers are so valued and appreciated, why aren’t companies stepping up to SHOW us that appreciation with the goodies they dangle in front of people who aren’t yet customers? Why do they wait until we hear that someone else got a cheaper rate, a bonus something, a sweeter deal? Why do they make us call and demand better treatment, the same treatment a prospective customer would get?

I know, it’s a sign of the times. A sad sign, to be sure.

Image credit: Salvatore Vuono and FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

It’s okay to follow up.

That was my message this week to a friend who runs an aesthetics business out of her home. Pat has been in business a number of years, but at one point went from being there all week to only a couple of days when she worked part-time at a local salon. Now that she’s back working from home full-time, she realizes that some of her past clients may think she’s still at the salon.

I encouraged Pat to phone her past clients to let them know, but she said, “I don’t want to bug them.”

As one of her clients, I can say that this type of call is welcome.

• She has been a valued service provider for years, and I want to know that she’s more available to me if I need a manicure on short notice.
• It’s a good chance for Pat to see if the previous clients still want to hear from her, or if they would prefer to be taken off her list.
• At the same time, she can collect email addresses. Then she can easily let people know about new products or services, any specials she’s running, or just remind us that, say, spring is a good time to think about a pedicure.

This type of follow-up is nothing like the annoying call centre calls from people you don’t know trying to sell you something you don’t want. So if you’re in Pat’s position, think about the relationship you have with your clients. Will they appreciate hearing from you if you can be more available or valuable to them, even if you haven’t talked lately? Is it useful for you to know if they don’t need your services any more? In both cases, I think so.

So don’t put yourself in the same boat as telemarketers. Follow up!

Image credit: Thanks to Michal Marcol and FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

My colleague forwarded what appeared to be a broadcast e-mail message to company employees. As someone using remote access, did I get a direct message? I can’t recall seeing one. And I certainly didn’t get a two-step warning, with a few weeks’ advance notice and a reminder a couple of days before the plug was pulled.

So that’s the “takeaway.” If you’re making a change that affects people who use your system, buy your product, visit your store, please tell them. Tell them more than once. Don’t make them find out by chance.

Oh, those funny folks at Honda! They’re doing a good job of keeping in touch with me, long-time Honda owner that I am. But their enthusiasm for selling me a new car always seems to overtake their good sense.

I bought a 2009 Honda Civic last year, and I’m happy with it. But one of the first pieces of mail they sent me after the purchase was a flyer promoting their new 2010 models.

Today, they sent me an e-mail. Surprise! It recognized that I am celebrating the one-year anniversary of my purchase.

“We appreciate your loyalty to our dealership and invite you to take advantage of the coupon below,” the note said. I wondered if my “owner loyalty certificate” would cover a free oil change, or maybe a half-price car detailing. No, it was $500 to use on my next vehicle purchase.

In small print was the note that the coupon expired within 30 days.

I guess despite the fact that I kept my last Honda for 10 years, having my newest car turn one year old means it’s time to get rid of it.

What I learned from my correspondence from Honda is that it’s not enough to know a few things about your customer. You have to pull together all the pieces of information you have on your customer — remembering to find and include the information held by other departments in your company (hello, Sales? meet Service). Did she just buy a car a month ago? Then there’s probably no reason to send her news about the latest model. Did she keep her last car for 10 years? Then a promised discount to buy a new car after just one year is not likely an incentive.

If you don’t make the connections, then you’re just wasting your time.

A few weeks ago, I managed to live through a day where no e-mail messages made it to my in-box. It took a while to find out, because I could send messages; but the replies didn’t make it through.

Of course, I had a satisfying chat with Bell’s customer service folks in another country:

Me [after visiting the Bell web site, which proclaimed its e-mail service was "available"]: I am not receiving e-mail.

Bell: Please do not worry. This is a problem on our end. Our server level technicians are already working on the problem and it will be fixed as soon as possible. We really appreciate your patience.

Me: Oh, then why does it say “this service is available” on the Bell site?

Bell: I apologize for the inconvenience caused to you. [Notice question not answered.] You will be able to send emails but there is a server issue which is causing a delay in receiving emails.

The problems lasted just the one day, but I feel compelled to add “as far as I know.” Because now, when I don’t receive a prompt response to an e-mail, I begin to wonder if the person sent it weeks ago, and is now getting cheesed off with me for lack of response.

All of this to say, please be sure to respond to people. If you don’t have the answer, a short note to acknowledge that you got the request and are looking into it is perfect. Even saying “I’m crazy busy, will answer some day” works for me. And if you didn’t get a reply within a day or two from a person who usually gets back to you quickly, there’s no harm in calling; sometimes that’s when you’ll find out he or she is away.

Or am I expecting too much?

Why my bank has hired people to make “courtesy calls” to customers — which seem to be thinly disguised ways to sell other products/services — but cannot tell me that they have discontinued my paper statements?

I have no problem getting my statement online, but I suddenly realized that I hadn’t seen a paper statement for months without seeing confirmation that it would no longer be mailed to me. Online, I see that I have the option of choosing one paper statement free, and any others will cost me. I have three accounts, and I only want one statement anyway; the free version is not applied to this one. Who did it? The bank’s not saying. This is the bank, by the way, that hired people to call and ask me if I thought the bank “cared” about  me.

Why a department store hid a similar statement fee notice in a densely worded document from a financial company?

When I first saw the notice, I almost threw it out as  junk mail, because I didn’t recognize the financial institution, and there was no obvious mention of the store or its logo. Inside, point #15 revealed that a $1 processing fee would be charged for each paper statement, but you could instead register for online access and get an e-statement.

As I say, I have no problem with online statements, or charging a fee to get one mailed. I do have a problem with companies not making change obvious to customers. Don’t you?

Does that seem like excellent customer service, to make a change that could possibly result in customers not being able to use the service they have paid for?

Bell has helpfully provided an “Internet Check-up” tool to see if any updating is needed. Oh, but too bad for me, it’s “currently only compatible with Windows.” As the Bell site curtly informed me, “You are running a Macintosh operating system.” Not to worry, though; “Efforts are ongoing to provide a Macintosh compatible version as soon as possible.”

Bell has been tinkering with their system for a few months now, causing random unexplained grief. First, the mail system stopping playing nice with the e-mail program I use. Then, I discovered that I had somehow been given a limit on how many messages I could send in 24 hours, without being told I had a limit. So although I administer a mailing list of about 230 association members and have been regularly sending messages to them for about two years, I suddenly got an error message that said, “Requested action aborted. You have reached the limit for how many messages you can send in 24 hours.”

I tried to e-mail Bell’s support account to find out what was going on, but of course I was over my secret limit. So I tried online chat and found out my limit was 250 e-mail messages a day. When I explained my problem and asked that my limit be raised to accommodate the mailing list I administer, here’s what happened:

Bell: I would need to escalate the issue to a higher tech support to get this issue resolved.

Me: Please do so.

Bell: I suggest you wait for 24 hours for the limit to be raised.

Me: You mean I can’t e-mail anyone else today?

Bell: Sorry to say a yes.

Me: That’s not very responsive service. I can certainly wait 24 hours to send a bulk e-mail but another 10 to 15 today doesn’t seem like much to arrange.

Bell: I do understand your concerns but we need to wait.

Well, the limit has been raised, although I didn’t get official notice of it and have no idea what it is. All I know is that I’ve been able to send several bulk mailings to the group. But you see why I am a little worried about the changes happening January 31.

So if you are a company upgrading your systems, please make sure it’s a change that will actually improve customer service. Otherwise, you are just like the companies who advise they are “changing” their fees when really they mean “increasing” their fees — it’s not good news to the customer.

1.  To know you are an expert in your field. They don’t want you learning on their project; they want you to ace the job because of your experience and talent.

2.  To know you are committed to your business and will be there when they need you. Even if they aren’t regular clients, people like to know that you will be available to take on the occasional project.

3.  To know they can rely on you to deliver the work you promise. Your expertise (see #1) should allow you to turn in a project that’s close to if not exactly what they need.

4.  To be confident you are working on their projects and moving them forward, even when they don’t hear from you. Better yet, they want to hear from you occasionally in between deadlines with reports on how you’re progressing.

5.  That they can rely on you to meet your deadlines. Even better, that you’ll often or even usually be early. And if, for some reason, you won’t be able to meet the deadline, you’ll warn them early and work out an acceptable Plan B.

6.  That in an emergency, you will pull out all the stops/pull a rabbit out of a hat to turn a project around quickly. Preferably, this isn’t the client’s standard request, or you will certainly be within your rights to charge a higher fee or turn down the work.

A track record at meeting these expectations is what earns repeat business and a solid reputation.

What have I missed?

Take my bank, for instance.  It just had a survey company call to ask about my experience as a business account holder. It was a nice gesture, but frankly, it was a waste of my time and theirs.

The questions mostly began, “On a scale of 1 to 9, do you think…”.  They wanted to know whether I thought the bank cared about me as a customer (not particularly; banks in general seem to nickel and dime customers, and they’re quick to charge interest but slow to pay it). They wondered if I felt appreciated (can’t think of anything the bank has done to show appreciation) or had been made to wait too long (more than once). They wondered if I had a relationship with the person managing my account (there’s a person managing it? really?). And they took at least eight minutes to run through it all.

If you’re going to survey someone, one of the first rules is that you only ask a question when you can or plan to do something with the answers. So is the bank going to change anything if the survey people find that 75 per cent of customers don’t feel appreciated, and 85 per cent don’t think the bank cares about us? Can we look forward to hand-written notes of appreciation or an extra 0.5 per cent interest on our accounts? I doubt it.

By all means, survey your customers. But make sure to ask questions that they can actually answer and that will give you information you can and will act on. And if someone repeatedly says, “I can’t answer that” or “I have no idea,” think about changing the question.

• When a web site makes me log in, but has nowhere for me to log out.
• When a site makes me log in more than once (for instance, once to enter a members-only section, and again to comment on a discussion forum).
• When my e-mail program randomly logs me out. Hello, I can see a security reason if I haven’t touched it for hours, but don’t do it when I’ve just used it minutes ago!
• When my client’s Outlook logs me out when I’m in the middle of writing an e-mail. Same thing; I get the security aspect of not being touched for hours, but I’m using it!
• When I send something to print and specify black only, but just because one of the coloured inks is low, I have to push a button on the printer itself that says “print in black only.”
• When the printer manufacturer bugs me to fill out a survey about my printer use, saying how valuable my feedback is. Then the survey only asks things like how many printers are in the house and if I use them for personal or business use, and doesn’t offer an open-ended question where I can actually give some feedback.

But, hey, it’s Friday afternoon and the sun is shining. So I’m getting off the computer now. If you’re still on, what bugs you?