TCBY - Frozen Yogurt, Frozen Service

Perhaps frozen is too harsh as last night was my only experience with TCBY in the 21st century. I recall as a kid of the 80's that TCBY was ultra popular then and growing up in the hot, humid environment of Florida, it was almost expected that I'd visit TCBY once (or more likely, twice, a week).

Last night I found one and was surprised they were even around anymore. (I hadn't seen one in probably 10 years and only then, they were still down in the tropical Florida climate.) I'm not going to say the service was completely bad, as I found out that TCBY's service model in the 21st century is "self-serve." That includes the yogurt, which comes out of devices that look like the ones that churn out that cheap soft serve stuff you might find at some Chinese restaurants (or Jason's Deli) and the toppings, which shockingly are not really covered or temperature condition controlled. That's not a service issue, but kind of a health issue, but since this is not a health blog I won't go into it.

Anyways, I know what you are thinking: Jonathan, is your self-servicing of frozen yogurt so bad that you are now calling yourself out on your own blog? Nope, my skills are up to par with the exception of some yogurt making it over the edge of my cup. My wife's skills were up to par too.

Now what happened that relates to the purpose of this blog is that I paid for our cups and we sat down, not far from the register. (The girl behind the counter was very friendly and we were friendly to her, so we thought all was cool, while we ate our tasty treat.) Soon, I heard her comment to a co-worker "this is going to be a slow tip night." I must have spun around like a person about to be attacked from behind and surveyed the counter for any tip jar. I saw one and had not noticed it before. It probably was there, but I was so intently concentrating on buying the yogurt, which not only did my wife and I procur from the machines ourselves, then add our own toppings ourselves and then were told to weigh it ourselves on a scale, that I just didn't notice it. Trust me, I worked for tips eons ago and am always conscious of that in a service industry. But in my defense, what exactly was I tipping for?  The literally 30 second scan of my credit card?  No exaggeration, it was that quick? I mean she was paid probably minimum wage which is normal but she wasn't a server in a restaurant or a coffee diva or dude who actually served me my coffee. It's obviously expected in a coffee house and I am more than happy to do so, but at TCBY where I did all the work? She wasn't necessarily rude about it and even pleasantly said goodbye, but it remained with me, making me feel guilty for not tipping someone who frankly did no real service other than her job, which was a 30 second job at that.

Time Warner Cable - Only Their Roadrunner Is High Speed, Not Their Service

I'm not sure how far Time Warner Cable's reach has gotten in the 21st century, but for the southeastern portion of the U.S., it seems to be a monolopy unless you use a satellite provider. And as we know with any monopolies, this is even more incentive to not really care about customer service as they know they have you trapped, basically.

I recently moved and had to get TWC service installed in my new house. I already dreaded it as I have had some prior bad experiences with TWC, but like I said above, there's no competition (unfortunately) and I had to go with them again or use satellite which has its own slew of problems. Anyways, I had an appointment set for last Sunday, mid-morning, in a two-hour window. Obviously with any appointments, people have to schedule their day around it, which I did. As the window approached, I didn't receive a call like I had in the past, saying that they were on their way. (That should have been more insightful to me at the time, but hey, I was just happy to finally be getting it installed and another new home chore finished.)

I waited...and waited. It was a few minutes before the appointment time and I called TWC. The automated robotic message, which I swear is technology's way of making a person feel even less important and give businesses a further disconnect in their service, acknowledged my appointment and even said that I should wait to call TWC until the appointment window had been reached. (I disregarded that attempt at prolonging the inevitable.) The representative told me that they would have to contact the technician and then would know what was going on. I told her I had not received any call at all; not one to tell me that they were on their way, nor one to tell me they were running late. She apologized--and trust me, if I made money based on apologies received based on poor customer service, I'd be a millionaire now. She put me on hold to try to track down the technician and then came back and said that he was running late and gave me the new time which was hours after the original. I told her I'd need to reschedule.

I've learned over the years that when you tell a business that you need to reschedule, you might as well be asking for trouble. The appointment was re-scheduled to a 8am-9am time slot (yes, only a one hour one--that sounds swell, doesn't it?) during the work week, which resulted in me having to take off some time from work in the morning. Well, 8am came around awefully quick and I was having the worst case of deja vu. No call, no show. I called TWC, was rather abrupt this time as this is the catch-22 of the customer/business relationship. The business is at fault, but they typically sound cool and collective. The customer is NOT at fault and typically sounds like they are about to go ballistic, which later tends to make the customer feel somewhat guilty, when they really shouldn't. I was told the same as the first appointment. He was running late and wouldn't be out for a few hours past the initial appointment window. I told her I couldn't wait as I needed to get into work and I told her I expected TWC to "make this right," which of course is code for I had better get some money back for TWC wasting my time. Isn't my time worth a monetary value?  I think it is. She said a $20 credit would be put on the account for the no show. I thanked her and went to work, annoyed and wondering how the third scheduled appointment would go, which was to be the following Sunday (yesterday) at 8am-9am. (Yes, I know, once a sucker, always a sucker, but I really wanted an early morning appointment and trusted that TWC could manage it.)

So, the third appointment day came, which was yesterday. Rod Serling of "The Twilight Zone" fame could not have written this any better. Of course, 8am came and NO SHOW and NO CALL. Talk about feeling furious. I had to contain myself just to talk in a semi-civil tone to the poor TWC representative (and I do mean that as it wasn't this EXACT individual's fault, but she is the spokesperson for the company). She told me that there were 3 (and I repeat 3) appointments ALL scheduled for this one technician at the 8am-9am window. WHAT!? How is this even remotely possible without a time travel scenario involved. Say the technician goes to appointment 1 right at 8am. Well, most appointments take probably 30 minutes or so. Then he would be at the next one (given travel time) at maybe 9am. So you see where this is going. Much like the loathed doctor office appointment where they have 10 people all booked at 8:15am, this is EXACTLY what Time Warner Cable is doing. They are triple booking and it gets worse, but hold on a second for that golden nugget. After I am told that and that they have no idea when he will be out and can't seem to reach him, I demand to talk to a supervisor or manager. "None seem to be available, but we will have one call you back." She did give me another $20 credit and confirmed I had two other $20 credits as well for the other no show appointements. I basically ended the call and waited...

Now, this is the golden nugget of abysmal customer service that ALL businesses should really be more conscious of--the dreaded 3rd party vendor that is not a TWC employee but drives a truck with the logo and has a ID tag with TWC on it. Businesses do this to save money as these 3rd party companies probably think they won the lottery when they land an account like the TWC one. TWC knows they'd have to hire more employees and pay them good money, but why do that when you have a 3rd party vendor. The technician was pleasant enough, but honest that he just came from one of the three 8am-9am jobs and it lasted 3 hours, which is why he was late. Also, there was a lack in communication between TWC and this vendor in regards to the type of installation and fortunately I wasn't told it couldn't be done.

All in all, WHEN you get TWC service actually hooked up it is fairly reliable (though like I said, I have had prior issues), the problem is you may not live that long if you have to go through what I did. The amount of stress and tension and time lost is just ridiculous. It is time for customers to stand up to these companies and tell them I won't tolerate this. I stood up to them on the phone, demanding compensation, which I encourage all to do or these things will never change. I never did get the call from the supervisor/manager yesterday, but did get a call today. He said that he was sorry (apology # 501, recorded and saved for future reference) and that he would credit my account for the $20 and an additional $49 for the installation. When I asked about the other two $20 fees I was already told I'd get, he said he substituted the $49 for them because it would be more of a credit. I was in such a good mood today that I just didn't want to get into it with him that $20 x 3 (no show calls) plus waiver of $49 installation fee, is $109 and that what he suggested ($20 + $49 = $69) is NOT a better credit and actually is short changing me and staying in line with the "no-service" customer service that TWC has shown me over the last 7-8 days.