The Customer Service Survey
Help! Lemme outta here!
Fri - August 26, 2005 11:14 AM in
In the news today, we see that AOL has agreed to fork over $1.25 million for refusing to cancel customers' accounts. Apparently, in a bid to stem the loss of subscribers, AOL was giving big incentives to service reps who "saved" accounts when the customer called to cancel service.
In order to make quota, apparently some reps were simply ignoring customers' cancellation requests. It isn't clear from the media reports if this was AOL policy, or simply lack of oversight when some agents decided to get creative.
But either way, today AOL has egg on its face (though the fine itself is hardly enough to make a difference). Unfortunately, for those of us who track customer service, this wasn't much of a surprise. A couple years ago, when we ran a contest for Customer Service Horror Stories, one common theme was AOL customers who spent months trying to cancel service. [Disclaimer: AOL is not, nor has it ever been, a VocaLabs client. Maybe they should be.]
Sadly, the problem isn't limited to AOL. I had my own personal horror story a year ago when I tried to cancel a subscription which was on an "automatic payment" plan. The company simply refused to cancel the subscription without making me listen to a sales pitch--which I had neither the time nor inclination to do. Eventually the company cancelled my account--mostly because I had called my credit card issuer to specifically de-authorize charges from that company--but not before calling me a "huge freak" in an e-mail they sent me. Needless to say, they won't be winning back this customer any time soon, and I take delight every time I see the company's stock price sitting around 10% of its former value.
Especially with automatic payment becoming more and more common, it is very tempting for companies to try to stem a tide of fleeing subscribers. When charges are automatically posted to a credit card or checking account every month, it is simpler for a consumer to do nothing than go through the effort of canceling. Sometimes all it takes is a "special offer" or short sales pitch to save an account.
But when reps are given big incentives to score high percentages of "saves," and when oversight is minimal, it can be very tempting for an agent to "forget" to mark an account as cancelled. This seems to happen most often when a company is losing competitively, and hence the pressure to reduce churn is high.
So the monthly charges continue even though the customer no longer wants to be a customer. Trying to sort through the mess, the customer gets angrier and angrier, thus guaranteeing that the company will never everwin that business back (and generate a lot of negative word-of-mouth in the process). If things get bad enough, Eliot Spitzer may even get involved.
In the short run, the company may hold on to a few subscribers, but only at the cost of burning immense quantities of customer goodwill.
Consumer Tip: The most important lesson I learned in fighting my own cancel-my-account battle was to get the credit card issuer or bank involved immediately. If the company can't charge your account, then they have no leverage. Usually a short phone call to the customer service number at the credit card company will do the trick: "Hi, I'm calling because I've cancelled my account with SuperZoom Internet Service, and I want to let you know that they are no longer authorized to post charges to my account." If you send a written notice to the credit card issuer they are legally required to honor it, and it only takes five minutes to write the letter and $0.37 to mail it. If you mail a copy of the letter to the company you're canceling service with, then odds are they won't bother you again.
Posted by Peter Leppik
But either way, today AOL has egg on its face (though the fine itself is hardly enough to make a difference). Unfortunately, for those of us who track customer service, this wasn't much of a surprise. A couple years ago, when we ran a contest for Customer Service Horror Stories, one common theme was AOL customers who spent months trying to cancel service. [Disclaimer: AOL is not, nor has it ever been, a VocaLabs client. Maybe they should be.]
Sadly, the problem isn't limited to AOL. I had my own personal horror story a year ago when I tried to cancel a subscription which was on an "automatic payment" plan. The company simply refused to cancel the subscription without making me listen to a sales pitch--which I had neither the time nor inclination to do. Eventually the company cancelled my account--mostly because I had called my credit card issuer to specifically de-authorize charges from that company--but not before calling me a "huge freak" in an e-mail they sent me. Needless to say, they won't be winning back this customer any time soon, and I take delight every time I see the company's stock price sitting around 10% of its former value.
Especially with automatic payment becoming more and more common, it is very tempting for companies to try to stem a tide of fleeing subscribers. When charges are automatically posted to a credit card or checking account every month, it is simpler for a consumer to do nothing than go through the effort of canceling. Sometimes all it takes is a "special offer" or short sales pitch to save an account.
But when reps are given big incentives to score high percentages of "saves," and when oversight is minimal, it can be very tempting for an agent to "forget" to mark an account as cancelled. This seems to happen most often when a company is losing competitively, and hence the pressure to reduce churn is high.
So the monthly charges continue even though the customer no longer wants to be a customer. Trying to sort through the mess, the customer gets angrier and angrier, thus guaranteeing that the company will never everwin that business back (and generate a lot of negative word-of-mouth in the process). If things get bad enough, Eliot Spitzer may even get involved.
In the short run, the company may hold on to a few subscribers, but only at the cost of burning immense quantities of customer goodwill.
Consumer Tip: The most important lesson I learned in fighting my own cancel-my-account battle was to get the credit card issuer or bank involved immediately. If the company can't charge your account, then they have no leverage. Usually a short phone call to the customer service number at the credit card company will do the trick: "Hi, I'm calling because I've cancelled my account with SuperZoom Internet Service, and I want to let you know that they are no longer authorized to post charges to my account." If you send a written notice to the credit card issuer they are legally required to honor it, and it only takes five minutes to write the letter and $0.37 to mail it. If you mail a copy of the letter to the company you're canceling service with, then odds are they won't bother you again.
Posted by Peter Leppik
Posted at 11:14 AM | | | | |