He Likes Me More

Let me tell you a secret: the Better Business Bureau likes me more than they like you. You want to know why? I pay membership dues and you don’t. Oh sure, they’ll pretend to like you and be your friend, but as long as I keep paying my dues, I would have to either break the law or fail to carry through on a written promise to get BBB to side with you. You got that? BBB is my friend, not yours.

I was standing at the front desk on one of those dreary days on the week after New Year’s Day and business was dead. The Christmas rush had come and gone, Christmas returns has trickled through, and we were in that dead period at the beginning of the year before corporate budgets start kicking in and companies start buying new equipment. But that wouldn’t happen for a week or two… we were still at that point where nobody is really back at work from the holidays. Yes, they’re back, but not really doing anything.

So when a middle-aged lady and her daughter walked in the door, they had my attention by virtue of the fact that there really wasn’t anything else for me to be doing. After I ran down my standard “Hello, how are you? Welcome to the Computer Store, I’m the Assistant Manager, is there anything I can help you with?” spiel, the lady told me that she needed a new video card.

Upon inquiring as to what sort of video card she wanted, the lady told me that the video on their computer had gone out and she needed a replacement. As I told her, there are two parts to a computer’s video system: the video card and the monitor. Well, technically there are three, but nevermind. The point of this is that without testing the computer, it’s impossible to tell which of the components has gone out when the display stops working: it’s kind of like a string of those old Christmas lights… you have to figure out which part is bad before you can make it work and until you do, all you know is that one of the bulbs is bad.

My admonishment fell on deaf ears as the lady “knew” that it was the video card. Selecting a sale-priced unit of ~ $200, she strode up to the counter to make her purchase. Standing around looking equally bored, Jason decided to take part in the conversation with an admonishment of his own, “Now ma’am, I just need to tell you that we have a restocking fee of 15% of the original unit price for returned merchandise unless it’s broken. If you’d like to bring your tower in we can check that for you free of charge and even install the video card for $10.”

Muttering something about wanting to get her computer working tonight and not wanting to pay to have us fool with her computer, the lady payed and left. And yes, you guessed it, she returned the following day with the opened box and receipt in hand. As Jason and I had foreseen, she had returned with the video card.

“I’d like to return this please.” So I’ve noticed.

“Was there any problem with it?” She probably should have been clued in by the ring of falseness to my Helpful Manager Voice.

“No, but it turns out that I don’t need it.” Gotcha!

“Alright ma’am… the unit was $250, 15% of that is $37.50 off of $200.” Punching away a second, accounting for tax and all, her total came up something like $163.50.

“But I paid $200 for this video card!”

“Yes ma’am, but as I told you yesterday, there is a 15% restocking fee off of the original price for merchandise that is returned unless the part is defective.”

“You told me no such thing!” Oh God… “He Said, She Said.” But wait… I have a witness.

“Ma’am, why don’t you hold on a second while I get the Store Manager.”

“You do that!” Stupid old bag, Jason hates customers even more than I could imagine. If customer-hating were a contest, I’d be a modern-day skinhead to Jason’s 1920s Klansman. I may talk a good game, but I wouldn’t put it past Jason to actually hurt a customer.

Jason walked up to the front of the store, apologized and repeated what I’d just said. Unlike me, however, he felt no need to gloss over the events of the day before and proceeded to recall for her that we had offered to test her computer and had, in fact, foretold this very scenario. The insulted look on the woman’s face told me that she, too, recalled this scenario but the glint in her eyes told me she’d be damned if she didn’t get her full $200 plus tax. I was right.

She ranted and raved for a while about the evils of my store and how we had best refund her money lest she lead a crusade against our uncouth establishment. When this failed, she even went so far as to threaten us with her husband coming to wreak havoc upon our persons. She left threatening a report to the Better Business Bureau. Whatever.

Weeks passed, idiots came, idiots went, and finally, the new fiscal year was at hand and we busied ourselves building new systems, preparing price estimates and the like. And then it came in the mail: a compliant from the BBB. Now, you have to understand that I’ve literally been threatened with a complaint to the Better Business Bureau hundreds of times. Just about every time someone gets angry, “I’ll call the BBB on you” comes out, but this was only the third complaint I’d ever actually gotten from the BBB, and the first in roughly a year.

Now, remember how I was saying that the BBB was my friend and not yours? Apparently nobody had ever taught this lady that tidbit, nor had they informed her that unless you have written documentation to hold a business’s feet to the fire with, the BBB will side with their friend… the Business. So if you ever find yourself addressing a response to a complaint filed with the BBB, have fun with it… because all you really have to do is respond with the facts. So I brought the facts, and then I added some flavoring: I insulted the lady’s intelligence, noted that her daughter appears to have a loose grasp on reality, etc, etc, etc. And do you know what, BBB is still my friend.

And my customer with the selective memory? She took her video card with her against the day that I would refund her the $200 in full, plus tax. She’s still waiting.

~ by assistantmanager on June 28, 2007.