How to Solve Any Customer Service Challenge

Reader Comments
Back to blog

Patience and Perserverance! That's what works!

J Gaine of SC 2:32PM January 16, 2012

A thing I've had success with is if I call with a problem and the company rep. has a lack of knowledge or doesn't really seem concerned about my problem I hang up and wait for 15 minutes or so and call the company back.
9 times out of 10 I get a much more professional rep. and the problem usually gets solved.
It costs nothing to try this method and it usually work.
PS you can call numerous times until you get the right person and satisfaction.
Don S
Ohio

Donald Skirvin of OH 12:17PM January 16, 2012

You are correct in that being a pit bull can eventually pay off. In 2001, my husband and I bought health insurance. The company gave me a slip (6" x 1") that said if I paid the premium that day, that I was completely covered. My son broke his collar bone and the company claimed that I wasn't covered until the beginning of the month. Anyway, 1 1/2 years later, I was still pursuing the claim. (It was only about $100. But I was persistant.) I finally met someone who knew the president of the company. The president said, "But if we pay her claim, we'll have to pay all the others like this." That was all I needed. They ended up paying my claim and removing the clause that said you were covered immediately. After all, if your insurance didn't start until the beginning of the next month, why would anyone pay immediately? I felt great! Thanks for the tips.

Marlene Giese of WI 11:30AM January 16, 2012

I would love to figure out how to get our health company to stop trying to get out of covering a health medical expense under our policy. I was appalled at BCBS in Virginia last year. Even though one of their own BCBS approved neurologist wanted a cranial MRI for our son to rule out any problems after he banged his head, they refused to cover any of it even though it would not have cost them a dime since all we have is an HSA high deductible plan. They simply would need to put a reduced expense amount under our high deductible plan. We would pay the reduced amount from our HSA. They refused to budge even though our neurologist appealed this twice at BCBS with the highest medical staff. The MRI facility knew what happened and agreed to give us a big 60% reduction in cost that we paid them from our HSA. There was no problem found. I tried to change our health company to another one this year, but I was again appalled when the new company refused to cover our son under the policy since he appeared to a have pre-existing problem after banging his head. I appealed that since all of our son's symptoms went away and he now totally normal with no further cranial treatment at all since the MRI. I decided to just stick with our old BCBS carrier since the new carrier acted about the same as BCBS and refused to budge with their denial.

Martin Katz of VA 9:50AM January 16, 2012

As the editor for the site HelpDeskGuides, I particularly like the line, "Often, a company's leaders have no idea that customers are being treated poorly, and are so appalled by a disgruntled consumer's letter that they help almost immediately."
It's important to remember that a CEO can fix almost any problem and that they need to empower their customer service reps to do the same.

JR Wall of PA 4:11PM January 15, 2012

Those are useful tips, thanks for sharing, Exasperated.

Kimberly Palmer of 2:59PM January 11, 2012

Coming from a Call Center Rep myself, you are more likely to get what you want by:
1. Be kind. Remember we are human just like you, don't start off defensive, it makes us less likely to be helpful.
2. Know what you are talking about. Do a little research yourself before calling a call center, more than likely you will find what you are looking for or will be better informed as to what you are talking about and what we are talking about.
3. Customer is not always right. This is the biggest misconseption ever! In this day in age people are looking to get anything they want for free or cheapest possible. Remember if you are demanding a massive credit, that is that much less the company has to improve infrastructure to keep the issue from happening again.
4. ACT YOUR AGE!!!!! I can not tell you how many times I have talked to business owners, that call in and act like a 12 year old child on X-Box Live. If you own a business, act like you would infront of your customers.

Exasperated CCR of KY 12:51PM January 11, 2012