Even the biggest and the best, the most renowned companies in our country make customer service blunders…do you? What if anything, can be learned by examining customer service shortfalls of “the best?”

Let’s look at two experiences, one dealing with a large national bank and the second with an huge phone service provider. As the customer, I was disappointed with both, vowed never to do business again with one, but willingly continue with the other. Why?

On visiting my bank to have some papers notarized, the service received was both courteous and prompt. It was “nature calling” that created disappointment. The nationally recognized, customer service award winning bank did not have a bathroom for customer use.

They politely explained that security reasons precluded them from allowing me to use the same facilities that employees enjoyed but as the customer, I didn’t give a bleep about their security regulations. I wondered why their architect had not taken into account a basic human need of its customers.

Later, an honest mistake was made by a teller which resulted in my receiving and being charged for thousands of deposit slips that I had not ordered. The branch office referred me to the customer service department who “resolved” the charge in a surprising way.

The original charge for the non-ordered deposit slips was $40- of which all but four dollars was forgiven. The remaining four dollars was taken from a “free credit” of $50 given to all business customers. I still hadn’t ordered the deposit slips and wondered “Why irritate a customer for four dollars?”

Another example involved use of an old prepaid phone card from a national company with 650 original minutes. An automated voice told me it had “expired” and my curiosity was peaked to know how many minutes had remained.

On calling the 800 customer service number, after five minutes of varying voice menu selections I pressed zero and…after five minutes more got a live customer service representative, who was extremely pleasant.

After very professionally asking me for information to identify the card he told me it expired in October of 2005 and had 116 unused minutes on it. I asked him if there was anything he could do for me, and he politely apologized and said that it’s clearly stated on the back of the card that it expires two years from the time it activated.

Thanking him for his explanation, I told him I had just read that information on the back of the card utilizing my magnifying glass and that he was absolutely right. Once again, asked him if he could do anything for me, to which he replied that he was sorry, there was nothing he could do.

At six cents a minute, they had just screwed me out of $6.96, a small price to pay to make a customer happy. This left me, as it might you, with commitment that I will never do business with them again.

Why do I continue to do business with the bank and not the phone company? It’s the inconvenience factor. I can easily purchase a phone card anywhere without any hassle. To change banks is not as easy…but when it is…I probably will!

As we have seen, even the biggest and the best, the most renowned companies in our country make customer service blunders? What can be learned by examining these customer service shortfalls? Could keeping a customer happy and doing business with you for life be as simple as listening and cost less than ten dollars?

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