Reading

I just finished a fantastic book.  And since I am always on the lookout for new reading material I thought I might share with you in case you are doing the same.

This is the 3rd of her memoir books.  And let me just say that if I had Mary Karr's gift of stringing words one after the other and creating the most amazing mental pictures I would die happy.  So many times I read a book/article/poem/whatever and nothing, no emotional response.  But Mary Karr's work?  Well, that is something else entirely.

Here is what the cover of her first book looks like:

The one in the middle between these two chronologically is called "Cherry".  Also amazing.

There are very few writers who by their very words can reach in and touch your heart.  There are even fewer who grab your heart and twist it into pieces and rearrange it in a way you never knew was possible.  Mary Karr is one.  Salman Rushdie and Margaret Atwood also do this for me.

If you are not familiar with these books, take my recommendation and give Liar's Club a try and work your way through to Lit.  Then come back and thank me.  I sincerely hope you enjoy her books.

Customer Service or Dis-service, you be the judge

Y'all, I really hate to be the person who just rants and bitches but unfortunately someone has to do it.  And once you turn 50 you lose that little part of you that just gives a shit what other people think. So, there's that.  It is now my job to call people on their bullshit and not to take any.

I was on etsy or pinterest or one of those sites that leads you down a rabbit hole of websites and found my way to a website that is selling some really cute, cute things that I thought I needed for Christmas gifts.  Really cute.

And so I looked at the website for the "about us" to see who these people are, where the money is going to, etc.  And there is a whole bunch of photos of the people who own/operate/run this company, but no information as to where they are geographically.  No physical location.  I clicked on the "contact us" button to ask a few question regarding a couple of items and it opened up an email.  So I went back and looked and yes, only email, no phone.  WTH?  No phone number?

I emailed and explained what my questions were and said I would like some customer support.  I got a really prompt return email with these words Thanks for reaching out! Unfortunately we don't offer all call center at this time, as we are an online business only. But I can help you via email!


Okay, that seems odd to me that because you are online you don't think people will ever need to talk to you.  That makes it even MORE likely that people will have a phone inquiry.

After several more email back and forths with the customer service person I placed the order with the choice of using Paypal for my payment since I didn't feel great about giving my credit card information to people who don't even have a phone.  And I sent her an email saying that I had ordered and to let me know if there was a problem.

And you'll never guess what!  

There was a problem.  She didn't get the order.  So I spent a ridiculous amount of time going all over their website trying to figure this out. And the website order form kept giving me a gigantic yellow yield sign saying I am required to give them my email address.  On the paypal payment page it had a square to check if I wanted them to share my email with the company or not, so I went back and checked that box and filled everything out again for the FOURTH TIME and you will not believe this but where they wanted me to fill in my email address?  THERE WAS NO SPACE TO PUT IT!!

If I put my cursor in the tab above it and hit my tab key it dropped right down past the email question to the next space.

So I sent off yet another email to the customer service person describing the situation and said please have someone call me to place this order or I am just going to forget about it.  And gave her my phone number.

And you'll never guess what happened next!

SHE EMAILED ME AGAIN!  She didn't call me!  Here is her reply to my request for them to call me:  Thanks for keeping me updated. So sorry the websites being difficult! Just to let you know I am going to do, I am forwarding this conversation to the owners so they can try to troubleshoot.

And if I can get your order via email, we will send you a PayPal invoice and order that way!

Are you believing this?  I got that one last evening and I had to sit on it overnight to not reply "Are you fucking kidding me??"

This is the email that I shot back to her today "I appreciate you being so prompt and getting back to me right away.  Because customer service is such a big part of the shopping process to me, I am going to say that it feels really awkward to me that there is no way to reach a person on the phone and try and resolve the issues i am having with this order.

I have gone out on a limb and trusted leaving my phone number with a total stranger and said that I would prefer if someone could just call me and we could get this ironed out.  And I get yet another email instead of a call.

So this makes me suspicious of a company that doesn’t have a responsive way to help customers through a website that has some issues.  No phone, really?  I just don’t think I can give my credit card and home address information to a company that doesn’t have phone support.

Sorry we couldn’t have done business together.  Your stuff looked really cute."

What do you think?  Are these people on the up and up?  Will they respond?  Will I ever get a phone call?  Would you try to work this hard to spend money?

I just don't understand the whole "one size fits all and this is the ONLY way we do business" mentality.  Every person has different needs and if you are dealing with the public you are going to run across loads of different kinds of people.  And all I wanted was a few questions answered and then for them to fix their stupid order online form that wasn't working.  

My guess is that they will not reach out to me to try and rectify this and I will not get to purchase these cute things and I will have to go to Plan B on the Christmas gift list.

Let me know your thoughts on this or just how you feel about customer service in general.