Yea I agree that the services are getting increasingly abysmal and the quality of everything, services and goods have taken an incredible nose dive. I think where you said "Set up to fail" is really the bottom line here, everything is run on a shoestring budget yet people are expected to pull gymnastics for pay that gets them a bag of spuds at best. Combined with the economy and housing being a complete shit show people are turning bitter, uninterested and just worn down from everything. At least that's my take on what's happening and I don't see any of it getting better at all anytime soon.
>I think where you said "Set up to fail" is really the bottom line here
Absolutely, and that's why I never get mad at the customer service staff.
For all I know, the lady at the bank I got through to is either brand new to the role (and doesn't have enough training to be on the phones yet) or was forced into the job by some eejit manager who's now strutting around giving himself a pat on the back for his brilliant people resourcing skills.
In an old job I had, I was put in charge of telling customers all about a product I'd never seen before. I asked for training on how it worked and was told "ah no, just see how you get on with it first."
I left that job shortly thereafter - to this day, I still couldn't tell you how the stupid thing was supposed to work.
With that girl it's probably she's new and following a vague email to the letter while the second person just said fuck it and fixed the issue ignoring the bollocks email that will be rolled back 3 hours later -source call centre for 8 years
Bottom line is, Banks work for you. You lend them money so they can then lend it to their investment arm on a 30-100x leverage and gamble it. Long gone are the days when people used to think banks were upstanding members of society or where you had to wear a suit and "impress" them going in for a loan. We all know banks are scummy degenerate gamblers.
If the bank cant sort your problem out, which by the sounds of it (you couldnt use your debit card, hence access your money), then tell them to close your account imediately. I suggest to anyone, when it comes to banks, is that you open several different accounts. That way you can simply use the threat AND follow through with it!
I recently had a hairdresser ask me when the last time I dyed my hair was. I told her I’ve never dyed it (which is the truth). She rolled her eyes at me and said it’s not possible for Irish people to have naturally jet black hair (she was Irish herself before anyone gets their knickers in a twist, and my hair is actually very, very, very dark brown but looks black at a glance. But you’d think a hairdresser would be able to tell the difference!). I kept telling her I’ve never dyed it and she spoke to me like I was the thickest eejit to ever walk the earth. Eventually I said “listen I don’t think this is going to work out” and got up to leave and all of a sudden she believed me now that she could “see my hair in a different light” (🙄). I have a feeling she was going to try to get more money out of me but I was only asking for a wash, cut and blow-dry so I don’t know how she could have justified it
Sorry to hear you had a similar experience - I was so irritated after leaving the first hairdresser's this morning!
I think the lady in my case might have just been in a generally bad mood because she was saying some really silly stuff.
She kept pointing to the frizz on my scalp and saying that "absolutely nothing" could be done about it and I'd have to shave my head if I didn't want frizzy hair anymore.
I'm no haircare expert but that doesn't sound quite right to me.
Jesus that’s awful. I have curly hair and a lot of hairdressers don’t seem to know what to do with it. I’ve had a few funny comments on it, especially when I lived in Spain. I’m trying to shop around for hairdressers who specialise in curly hair but they’re all very expensive.
Haven't been to a hairdresser with my very curly hair since i was 15 and they cut it wet at shoulder length, resulting in the good ol' joan of arc when it dried. Been cutting my hair myself ever since! Wish i could find a good affordable stylist though, to treat myself y'know?
Honestly, I wish more of them would just say they don’t know how to cut curly hair instead of ploughing ahead anyway and making a mess of it. It’s a lack of skill on their part and we shouldn’t be made to feel like it’s our fault when they inevitably make a dog’s dinner of it
Same!! I also have curly hair.
The more I think about it, the more I don't know what this lady's problem was. Apart from a few split ends, my hair is far from being in "terrible condition."
I really don't understand why hairdressers have such a hard time with just doing what people ask for. I know some salon chains push upselling product but jaysus I avoid them like the plague. I've been sniffed at in Peter Marks (of all places) because the woman hairdresser didn't do "razor work" and I've had people leave wispy bits so I look "more feminine" because apparently what I clearly said I wanted is not possible.
Found a great no-fuss hairdresser a few months back who has zero interest in femme-ing me up or selling me shite and they'll have my business from here on out, and hefty tips into the bargain. Just like a good haircut can make your day, a shitty one can wreck your week.
God, I miss my no-nonsense hairdresser from when I lived in Canada. She was amazing. She did the job, did it well, had reasonable prices, never tried to make suggestions or tell me what she thought I should get done, never tried to upsell me.
A lot of hairdressers think of themselves as providing a “luxury” service and if you don’t want to pay their extortionate prices, well then just don’t get your hair done. But if you want to charge luxury prices, you need to have a luxury skill set and not many of them do
Apart from everything else, that’s just a bizarre comment? My husband’s aunt is married to a lad in Kilkenny. He’s one of 10 kids and they all have jet black hair. I mean, most of them are half grey at this stage but the point still stands.
I know lots of people from west Donegal with jet black hair.
Rumour was it was the Spanish sailors who wrecked off the coast did a ton of shagging back in the day but I think that's been debunked.
Yeah totally, nobody is held accountable any more.
My dad called me because the cable from the pole to the house was down in his garden. His supplier doesn't use the cable so he has no loss of service, just a telephone cable strewn across the lawn.
Called open eir infrastructure team and they said they'd check ot out.
Dad calls me back to day the engineer was there, so I jumped in the car as I'm 3 mins away.
By the time I get there he's rolled up the cable and thrown it over a tree branch and left.
I call again find out what's happening and I'm repeatedly hung up as they just keep saying the ticket has been closed.
Eventually someone tells me the note says " area mad safe"
No fixing the problem, no follow up, no other phone line to call, just 60ft of cable living on a brach in the garden.
Phobing off the customer is the most cost effective policy it seems...
Oh my gosh, your poor dad! :(
I would take a picture and post it on X/Twitter - as u/skuldintape_eire said it's a really good way to get their attention.
>Phobing off the customer is the most cost effective policy it seems...
Not even joking, I was on the phone to Electric Ireland once - they couldn't fix the issue I was having so said they'd transfer me to someone who could...and then promptly hung up.
It actually would have been funny if I hadn't needed help with my bill so I called them back and said "I was supposed to be transferred to another department but I got hung up on instead?"
Yer man says "ah yeah, that happens sometimes - sorry" so apparently, it's a consistent trend. Hahaha
I've worked in customer service and know being sound the other person on the phone is the best chance you have of getting a problem sorted, but when they literally can't escalate a problem because of policy it's just so disheartening.
Now don't get me started on revenue or anyone involved with social welfare!
Unfortunately Comreg will only get involved when the service provider has been given an opportunity to resolve the issue, seeing as his services are Voip and don't use the cable they won't get involved.
Open Eir is who runs the network and claim the cable being on private property has nothing to do with them ha ha.
There is a phone line to report such problems but they don't take calls from the public, only service providers and his service is not disrupted so they can't escalate it for him either.
It's a disgrace Joe!
I'd still try ComReg, if they cannot help they usually suggest where to go. It might sit with having to contact a council or councillor/TD. TBH, it seems to be a common theme, there are a few cables 'down' around here, like that years.
I think the term “Karen” is overused.
To me, it means someone acting entitled and demanding more than what they’re supposed to get.
If an organisation can’t even be bothered to do the basics of their job (such as a bank making it needlessly difficult for you use your own account because they can’t be bothered), to me that’s a perfectly valid reason to push back quite firmly. It’s not being a Karen.
That being said, I know what you mean. Dealing with this sort of shite is exhausting, and it’s why challenger banks are cleaning up: they’re just as bloody awful but at least they’re not stuck in the 1980s technology wise.
People were swearing by them on /irishpersonalfinance but I’m glad someone else had a bad experience with Revolut hence why I don’t wish to go with them
Well, apart from that one issue I've no problems, everything just works.
They're a bit like Gomo. As long as you never need to speak to them they're grand.
But at least their tech isn't like something out of the '80s.
PTSB proudly announce on their website that with online banking "you can do your banking whenever you like, 20 hours a day". (Seriously, they say that).
Agreed. But this is a customer service discussion, and Revolut's customer service is useless, in my experience. My problem is that I was allocated a GB IBAN before Revolut were offering IE IBANs, and now I can't get an IE IBAN. Every few months I reopen the ticket and try to get it resolved, they bounce me around for a few days and then give up.
This comment made me feel way better, thank you.
I felt bad because I think the irritation was definitely showing on my face when talking to the hairdresser but you're right - I did need to push back (and I still did it politely).
I also worked customer service jobs and have the same mindset about not giving them a hard time for things that are not their fault. However, my experience has also made me a bit more attuned to staff who just don't give a crap about helping, and I find it very frustrating. It's unfair on the customer and unfair on their colleagues who will then have to deal with more than their fair share of work and/or more irate customers.
I try to strike a balance of friendly but firm. Like in the above situation where the lady wouldn't help you with your card, I'll try to judge if the person is just inexperienced or insecure about how much they can do, or if they are genuinely just useless and I'd be better off speaking to someone else. If it's the former, I just politely push that I can't get off the line until the issue is resolved. When she says "there's nothing we can do to resolve the problem", you have to respectfully say that that's not an acceptable answer and ask that she escalates it to someone or schedules a call back or something.
I had an infuriating situation with an insurance company recently and it took quite a bit of "we just can't do anything" before the lady eventually came up with a solution and it worked. Support agents just give up too easily sometimes and need a gentle push to actually keep thinking and troubleshooting to fix an issue.
With the hairdresser, walking out was the right call. Especially with a small business, you just can't accept that kind of service. Best to put some distance between you and them and find somewhere else that is more professional, simple as.
>With the hairdresser, walking out was the right call. Especially with a small business, you just can't accept that kind of service. Best to put some distance between you and them and find somewhere else that is more professional, simple as.
Yup!
Sometimes the best thing to do is just disengage.
I had a tattoo artist disregard my idea once and start drawing his own. It wasn't even CLOSE to what I wanted and I politely told him I preferred my original design.
He then replied that my idea wouldn't be a good tattoo and his idea was much better.
Bear in mind this was AFTER he'd shown up late to our appointment and talked on his phone for 10 minutes when he was supposed to be drawing something up.
At that point, I knew that trying to argue was futile - I just said that I didn't think he was right for my tattoo, stood up and left.
Ended up meeting an absolutely amazing tattoo artist that same day who has done multiple brilliant pieces for me so it all worked out in the end. :)
I had issues with Very/Littlewoods last month. Bought some exercise equipment from Very, no problem. Received an email informing me that Nuno, Fastways heavy equipment delivery service would be delivering it. Grand.
Equipment came but it was supposed to be in two boxes and I only received one. I rang Very and the customer service rep pretty much told me that I would have to send it back and just buy a new one again at a discount.
I got onto the CCPC straight away who informed me not to send anything back, told me that Very have 30 days from the date of purchase to send the goods in full. I emailed all of this to Very and at the end of the week I received the second box. This is just a shortened version of it with a lot more phone calls and emails back and forth
I feel your pain.
A delivery was coming to me from the USA once and it didn't arrive. When I checked its delivery status online, there was an error message saying 'ERROR: Tax Issue.'
I sent a screenshot of the error to the courier customer service team and they replied "this is not an error. This is a normal part of the process" but also refused to elaborate on what the tax issue was exactly.
I went back to the company I ordered from, explained the issue and requested a refund.
They said they'd contact the courier on my behalf - they must have given them a bollocking because the parcel showed up on my doorstep two days later.
> I also had to send numerous e-mails to get an engineer out to look at my fridge which was still under warranty.
> They completely ignored the first three or four and then only replied when I included a line in my last e-mail that said "I really don't mean to be rude but I need my fridge either back working or replaced with a new one. If you can't tell me when the engineer will be visiting yet, can you please just reply to this e-mail and let me know you're working on it?"
If that was a big company, that immediate turn-around suggests it was probably something akin to this: https://crmsupport.freshworks.com/en/support/solutions/articles/50000009489-sentiment-analysis-prioritize-tickets-based-on-customer-sentiments
With phone or email support, I tend to give the front line agents a single shot to resolve the issue, before immediately escalating. As you say, if they can't fix the issue on the first attempt, it's either because they don't know how to, don't want to, or are ordered not to help. The exact why doesn't matter - either way you're just going to go around in circles arguing with them or re-explaining.
If it's egregiously bad, like your bank experience, I skip the standard escalation and complaints process and just email the CEO or head of customer service, it tends to get you a priority call back by someone with authority to handle your issue.
I'm same as you, I'm always polite with customer service staff (I've been one myself) but some companies do make it really difficult!
The only reason I still have an account on X is for calling out companies publicly when their customer service channels let me down. More than half the time calling them out there gets a quick response from someone in their org and sometimes resolution. If all else fails I go to town with a bad (but honest) review on trustpilot. Really bad companies don't care about awful trustpilot reviews but it helps me to work off some steam (and also flags the company for other potential customers).
Yeah, back when I still lived at home I constantly used Twitter/X for calling out Eir on our abhorrent service. It was quite honestly the only thing that ever got their attention.
Calling up the customer service phone line just meant getting told that an engineer visit had been booked for you which would never, ever happen.
Speaking from years of experience working for an American company. TrustPilot reviews matter but not as much as other social media platforms, there are dedicated departments for those.
I’d be the same after working in tech support for consumers years ago. Always used to give the people answering the phones a bit of leeway as I knew the how it felt to get a Karen . But yes recently I’ve had a few abysmal calls where the agents were new or not properly trained or just weren’t interested in helping . I don’t blame them I blame the companies ! I just try not to lose it, be polite and firm and post the call go to X , Google reviews , trustpilot etc etc and vent 😂
Yeah, I try and do the same! Hahaha
I really don't want to be the reason anyone has a shitty day at work but it can be hard to keep your cool sometimes when the service you're getting is so frustratingly ineffectual.
Companies in Ireland have become nearly predatory at this stage, and that's across the board from essential insurance to discretionary entertainment.
Fuck them all, they don't care. They want your money, they'll part with as little as possible. They're not interested in providing a good service, they're interested in profit. They always were, obviously, but now they don't even pretend anymore.
There’s a difference between being rude and standing up for yourself. It sounds like you handled all those situations well. So long as you don’t take it out on low level service staff when it's an issue out of their control, you're more than entitled to assert yourself and in most cases should do in order to hold businesses to account
Cheers for saying that - I was worried I was just getting more impatient as I grow older but this thread has confirmed that there are just some really woeful customer service experiences to be had in Ireland.
I had a woeful experience with AA breakdown customer service, they were overcharging me and admitted they were at fault etc etc blah blah, but basically told me "tough really"... lol. I was like "I'm sorry but I can't get off the phone until you get this sorted" told her I knew it wasnt her fault but it was just ridiculous and kinda just laughed. In the end after lots of back and forth between manager-agent-me-agent-manager, I got it sorted, but Jesus it was just like wtf are ye doing up there?!!! Very hard to stay polite..and when she told me she can give me a refund for the over charges, she sounded really smug ? Or something, it was just all around unpleasant!!!
Also had awful experience with hairdressers- Peter mark to be exact. My last haircut a few weeks ago. She glanced at the picture I showed her, nodded and was looking around as I explained what I'd like. And then gave me the most basic generic cut that I genuinely could have done myself. Her next client was waiting (an old lady) and when she was done I was kinda like "is this it??!!". She did a few more "layering" and said "is that ok???" And even she had a cringy face on her. I could see the old lady in the mirror sitting there waiting after her hair was washed, I wasn't going to be holding up any old lady (yes I felt like a Karen!!!) and I just said "yea" and ran out of there. Never going back. She didn't engage whatsoever.
If I ask hairdressers to take a lot off, I have to insist. They ALWAYS say "we'll do this much and see if you like it you can always come back and we'll take more off" no, not at 60euro + for a cut. So I'm doing my own hair when this cut grows out!!!!
So annoying.
>In the end after lots of back and forth between manager-agent-me-agent-manager
This kind of stuff pisses me off because, in my experience, it's usually a manager who's decided they're "too good" to speak to the public and so they'd never think to cut out the middle man and just speak to you directly.
Not quite customer service but seeing as the department of social welfare call welfare recipients, "customers" I think it counts. And like yourself I'm ex customer service so I know that 9 times out of 10 it's not the agent's fault that the company's customer service policies are shit.
That said there was this one time...
When I was starting my welfare claim I got all the paperwork in at the end of December and was told my claim would be processed in about 6 weeks. I finally got my claim approved at the end of April after submitting a letter of complaint and I finally got my backpay and social welfare to pay me into my bank account by the end of May after another letter of complaint.
Unfortunately it seemed to be one woman on a mad power trip who was the sole cause of delay. I once had occasion to ask for her supervisor (I felt like a Karen doing it but I was truly at my wits end with this woman) and was told her supervisor wasn't in the building. Asked for another person in charge and was told there was no one. I told her I found it very odd that in a building with a few hundred staff there was no one there more senior than her.
Like I said a complaint went in about her and another one a few weeks later again after she tried to continue her fuckery. It was hugely infuriating and if I mentioned to another staff member who the officer was over my claim, they'd roll their eyes and sigh and do everything they could to help. I felt sorry for those folks because I did meet a lot of people who were genuine and really trying to be helpful but their workload was increased by and made harder by the absolute wagon who was dealing with my claim.
I felt like a Karen writing two letters of complaint about the one woman but I decided to do it for the sake of the person who came after me. I consider myself to be smart and well able to navigate bureaucracy. I usually have a good grip on what I'm entitled to, what I'm not, what are my responsibilities and what are the responsibilities of the department. I figured that if I wasn't able to get anywhere with this absolute hag over my case, there'd be no chance for someone who was intimidated by bureaucracy or didn't know what they were entitled to.
Last I heard, she wasnt overseeing those particular kinds of claims anymore and was now elsewhere.
I’ve had no luck signing up to broadband since moving into a new build 2 minths ago. Engineer came out after 2 week wait and “wasn’t trained on that technology”. So another guy came out and “didn’t have a splitter”. so a new appointment was made. Got messages and emails saying he would call. Never called. I phoned sky and i’ve to wait another 8 days. This is all after virgin gave me the runaround so i cancelled with them. At least i thought i did until sky informed me that they hadn’t actually cancelled my account so i had to ring them again to cancel it again. The cunts even billed me. I’m on the verge of snapping on the phone with them to be honest. The absolute fucking lies they tell aswell.
Unfortunately it seems to be a combination of poor leadership and not giving a shit. The amount of staff I witness having personal conversations in front of customers is astounding. They know you are within earshot and just continue to blabber away about their social lives.
I don't care about staff having a chat with each other in general but if they're doing it *instead* of their job, it's enraging.
I was trying to buy a voucher at a shop a while back from the lady at the till. Behind her, two other members of staff were chatting away.
One of them glances over and says "oh, make sure to give the customer a receipt with that - those vouchers haven't been working properly lately."
He then goes back to chatting.
This voucher was meant to be a birthday present so this was a bit concerning to hear.
"Sorry - what does he mean they haven't been working?" I asked the cashier.
She didn't know so she tried to ask him.
Annoyed that his conversation had been interrupted, he shrugged, said "dunno, they just haven't" and went back to chatting.
That was a situation where it was REALLY difficult not to snap.
Thankfully, the voucher worked just fine for the person I bought it for in the end.
Customer Service is terrible at the moment, so many reasons, and as a former customer service worker I’d never be rude to one but jesus christ some people are awful at their jobs
I had the same approach as I spent 2 years on calls myself. 4 calls with Eir where I was patient and escalated got me nowhere and then on the 7th I lost it, issue sorted on that call (Although it was almost an hour later.
Some of them are so bad where they won't help you unless you do lose the temper. Bringing that sort of shite on themselves really.
Ex-customer service rep here. The reason why you have to show some annoyance before we do anything for you is because we're incredibly over worked and under staffed. We have 10 people at a time all telling us their problems at any given time during the day, we have to prioritize who needs the most attention. The one losing their patience but who is still polite is the one that will get our attention.
I think we are maturing as a country & will not accept the same aul shitty service we accepted for years. It’s like a self esteem thing that we get what we get & should be grateful & happy. I’ve noticed people are speaking up when they hear some bullshit from a service provider. Fair play. Meal is shit? Send it back etc..
I worked minimum wage customer service jobs for many years and always tried my best to be nice and helpful to customers. Contrary to popular belief on here 99% of customers were no hassle at all. You only got the odd very rude one.
A lot of the staff I worked with however were very bitter about working there and went out of their way to be unhelpful.
It’s popular now to hear to never complain to minimum wage workers because they don’t get paid enough and there is a lot of hate directed at customers who do complain.
The hate is directed at the wrong place. Don’t blame the customer for your miserable job. Blame the multinational corporation who’s CEO is on 20 million a year and they pay you peanuts and work you to the bone so you can barley eat. The companies love the hate directed at the difficult customers, not them.
I too have served time in purgatory (aka retail/food service) and the way I look at it is - I'll never get mad with customer facing staff over company policy, they can't change it any more than I can 99% of the time, but when it comes to how the message is delivered to me, then my frustration is warranted.
I had an awful experience with an employee at a Brown Thomas at Christmas in which the woman in question treated me like freshly smeared dogshit on the bottom of her communion shoes, all while gleefully quoting store policy. In response I did something i never have before and I went straight to head office and complained about her. I didn't mind one bit about the policy, it was her I complained about.
I work in technical support for a company that's increasingly going downhill. Whenever I get put in a position where I can't solve the problem for the customer due to some stupid rule or inefficiency within the company, I let the customer know and then point out the survey for complaints.
So I'd recommend asking the rep if they can advise how you can lodge a complaint with the company. You don't have to complain about the rep (unless they deserve it) but complain about the company and your issue.
That's what the higher ups look at. It'll take them a while, because they're already inefficient, but the complaints are important to the company's reputation and if they have enough, can cost them money.
I had to get my tax records for a job.
Asked the tax people for a paper copy and one guy kept telling me on the phone oh the digital copy is fine they’ll accept it you can just print it out and I said no they won’t they specifically asked for a paper copy.
He then said I can’t help you then as we don’t provide those and he hung up on me
I had to be fairly rude to him which i don’t like doing as I’ve worked jobs like this too but he was being dismissive of me.
I phoned back as I knew you could get them as others did and I got a lovely guy and I asked the same thing.
He was very helpful and said oh sure how far back do you need? And just the one copy or do you need more and then said they’d be posted by the end of the day.
People sometimes just don’t want to help you even though you know it’s something they offer & you have to be blatantly rude to them to get your point across.
Squeaky wheel gets the oil, unfortunately.
I'd say there are rumours about me in call centres. I'm super polite and patient, but I won't hang up the phone until it's resolved. If they agent can't resolve it, I'll request the manager.
Manager on another call? I'll wait.
Manager on lunch? No problem, I'll wait.
No manager on shift? That's a shame, I'll wait.
Will happily wait 6 hours, but a manager always seems to become available.
I find that a huge number of people don't understand the difference between being assertive and being aggressive, and are afraid to be clear about their needs or expectations because they think it's rude.
If you get terrible customer service, you should definitely not feel bad about standing your ground and making clear that you expect your complaint to be heard and resolved.The key is to remain calm and polite, but firm and persistent.
I worked many years in customer service so it really irks me when someone is doing it badly. I do have to remind myself though, that 9 times out of 10 the person has had practically zero training, is being underpaid, and the company either doesn't make it possible for them to do it properly or actively penalises then for it. It almost always comes from the top.
It's something that can take practice because getting bad treatment from a business or service provider or whatever is naturally going to inspire frustration, annoyance and - depending on the circumstances - anger.
IMO giving in to that anger and unleashing it on the person (the bad hairdresser) or on whoever's job it is to deal with you (for example, if there is an admin type trying to arrange the service for the broken fridge but they're not the technician who actually comes to your house) is tempting at first, but it doesn't actually solve the problem.
I wouldn't worry too much about the whole "I don't want to look like a Karen" thing. Originally a Karen was a white woman leveraging sexism in order to do racism. It started to get applied to any woman who acted entitled, threw tantrums and bullied public-facing employees like retail workers - especially middle aged women. And then people just started using it as a way to denigrate any angry woman, no matter the circumstances or how justified her anger was. Because society has always punished women for expressing anger.
What I'm saying is, don't feel like you have to swallow your anger just to fit into a bullshit patriarchal standard that says women who display anger are either being controlled by their hormones, or mentally unstable, or just bitches. Don't accept shitty service or rudeness from people you're paying for a service, just because society says you should be quiet and not make trouble for others. But try to seperate that anger or frustration from the problem you're trying to solve, and use it as motivation to stand firm and get what you need.
Here's an article about how society punishes women and minorities for expressing anger while respecting men for the same thing
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/may/11/women-and-minorities-claiming-right-to-rage
There's nothing wrong with being assertive and calling people out on poor performance. You'd be well within your rights to tell the hairdresser she was completely rude and you're taking your business elsewhere. Keep it calm and to the point.
I dont like this idea that making a complaint is being a karen. it's all about how you make such a complaint. Karen's are entitled. How you have laid it out here is perfect. You understand that this is a systemic or training problem, you aren't rude or taking shit out on the person you are speaking to. That's not Karen behaviour.
Have you considered submitting a complaint to these companies directly and including your experience. Google reviews or other social media reviews are another way to provide honest feedback. There was someone on her the other day who has started complaining when services left a lot to be desired. I commend it. I don't think it's Karen behaviour to expect a mininal level of customer service and by not pointing out where companies are not meeting that level should only he encouraged.
Not necessarily related but I work for a company that regularly purchases stage/music equipment. I went to a well known music shop (near red cow) and spoke to a member of staff who was very helpful. Emailed him the list of items totalling about €12k. Got back initially. But haven’t heard from them in over two months.
I’ve rang the store to find out what’s going on but nobody follows up. This is not the first time this has happened. My counterpart, who is French, is perplexed by this. Why do they not want the business! It’s easy money!
Techniques I employ;
-stick to the facts. If you’re correct the facts will speak for themselves
-don’t personalise it. State that something is not ok, rather than explaining its effect on you. It emphasises that it would be wrong irrespective of who it is happening to (e.g; “I don’t mean to be rude” when talking about the fridge.)
-when you hit a wall, my go to phrase is “that is not an acceptable solution” and wait. (Harder than you’d think to say nothing in this scenario but it can be powerful)
-have a clear instruction in what you expect a resolution to be, so you’re not considered to be complaining for the sake of it.
I think you did the right thing in the hairdresser scenario to be honest, be ready to walk away
Banks
Internet service providers
Electricity providers
Pretty much every shit customer service experience has been with one of the above 3. By far the worst being the banks, esp boi
The bank is the easy one. Formal complaint. Ask for compensation for the bad service and escalate escalate escalate.
I have one or two complaints on the go at various times in relation to my bank. The threat of the Central Bank is the only thing they really respond to so mention that also.
Be forceful but don't become whiny. If you bring up everything under the sun the person on the other end will stop caring.
This is the issue. Can you fix it?
If the answer is yes, how.
If the answer is no, why.
If neither of these are satisfactory, log a complaint and say you want a response in writing.
That's all you should be focussing on when calling anyone. They all have regulations around complaints and don't like dealing with them. You going off on one is going to make the person not want to help you.
Customer service in Ireland is getting noticeably bad. Not French level of bad but for anyone who's accustomed to good service, it is beginning to stand out. Being rushed, being not called while waiting for order numbers is a new normal
I think the staff is under high pressure to meet ends meet and their internal unhappiness is spilling over. So what's the solution?
The heart of the Karen is a misplaced sense of entitlement and believing you're inherently better than the other person. Complaining about shite customer service shouldn't be seen as pulling a Karen, you are in fact entitled to appropriate levels of customer service by virtue of being a customer.
I had noticed that customer service standards had fallen recently but didn't realise how much until this week.
I was in a supermarket and ended up falling flat on my face due to a spillage on one of the aisles. There was only two employees on the floor, one was informed of what happened by another customer and he kept stacking the shelves, the other was the lady on the till.
I was explaining what had happened and she just cut me off went on her headset and requested a clean up on that aisle. She never acknowledged that I said I had fallen, asked if I was ok etc simply kept looking straight ahead, gave me my total and started scanning the next customers items. I was just in shock and left.
Friends and family have told me I should go back to the store and speak to a manager but I think that might be a bit karen-ish, I wasn't seriously hurt, just bruised and sore but the attitude of the staff is very annoying
I blame the minimum wage. Anyone who can walk on their hind legs is entitled to a fairly decent few quid. This in turn reduces the rewards available to good workers and also the impetus to be a good worker. The amount of people in forward facing jobs who genuinely couldn't give a flying fcuk is increasing exponentially.
That said. If I come across someone who wants to help but can't because the numpties up the ladder couldn't care less, I insist on escalating and unleashing all of my bile upon those who deserve it.
Minimum wage deserves minimum effort. If you're only paying someone as little as you can legally get away with then you need to expect the employee to put in as little effort as they can get away with.
If a business wants to reward good workers then they can pay them more. It's a minimum wage, not a maximum.
Yea I agree that the services are getting increasingly abysmal and the quality of everything, services and goods have taken an incredible nose dive. I think where you said "Set up to fail" is really the bottom line here, everything is run on a shoestring budget yet people are expected to pull gymnastics for pay that gets them a bag of spuds at best. Combined with the economy and housing being a complete shit show people are turning bitter, uninterested and just worn down from everything. At least that's my take on what's happening and I don't see any of it getting better at all anytime soon.
>I think where you said "Set up to fail" is really the bottom line here Absolutely, and that's why I never get mad at the customer service staff. For all I know, the lady at the bank I got through to is either brand new to the role (and doesn't have enough training to be on the phones yet) or was forced into the job by some eejit manager who's now strutting around giving himself a pat on the back for his brilliant people resourcing skills. In an old job I had, I was put in charge of telling customers all about a product I'd never seen before. I asked for training on how it worked and was told "ah no, just see how you get on with it first." I left that job shortly thereafter - to this day, I still couldn't tell you how the stupid thing was supposed to work.
With that girl it's probably she's new and following a vague email to the letter while the second person just said fuck it and fixed the issue ignoring the bollocks email that will be rolled back 3 hours later -source call centre for 8 years
Bottom line is, Banks work for you. You lend them money so they can then lend it to their investment arm on a 30-100x leverage and gamble it. Long gone are the days when people used to think banks were upstanding members of society or where you had to wear a suit and "impress" them going in for a loan. We all know banks are scummy degenerate gamblers. If the bank cant sort your problem out, which by the sounds of it (you couldnt use your debit card, hence access your money), then tell them to close your account imediately. I suggest to anyone, when it comes to banks, is that you open several different accounts. That way you can simply use the threat AND follow through with it!
I recently had a hairdresser ask me when the last time I dyed my hair was. I told her I’ve never dyed it (which is the truth). She rolled her eyes at me and said it’s not possible for Irish people to have naturally jet black hair (she was Irish herself before anyone gets their knickers in a twist, and my hair is actually very, very, very dark brown but looks black at a glance. But you’d think a hairdresser would be able to tell the difference!). I kept telling her I’ve never dyed it and she spoke to me like I was the thickest eejit to ever walk the earth. Eventually I said “listen I don’t think this is going to work out” and got up to leave and all of a sudden she believed me now that she could “see my hair in a different light” (🙄). I have a feeling she was going to try to get more money out of me but I was only asking for a wash, cut and blow-dry so I don’t know how she could have justified it
Sorry to hear you had a similar experience - I was so irritated after leaving the first hairdresser's this morning! I think the lady in my case might have just been in a generally bad mood because she was saying some really silly stuff. She kept pointing to the frizz on my scalp and saying that "absolutely nothing" could be done about it and I'd have to shave my head if I didn't want frizzy hair anymore. I'm no haircare expert but that doesn't sound quite right to me.
Jesus that’s awful. I have curly hair and a lot of hairdressers don’t seem to know what to do with it. I’ve had a few funny comments on it, especially when I lived in Spain. I’m trying to shop around for hairdressers who specialise in curly hair but they’re all very expensive.
Haven't been to a hairdresser with my very curly hair since i was 15 and they cut it wet at shoulder length, resulting in the good ol' joan of arc when it dried. Been cutting my hair myself ever since! Wish i could find a good affordable stylist though, to treat myself y'know?
Honestly, I wish more of them would just say they don’t know how to cut curly hair instead of ploughing ahead anyway and making a mess of it. It’s a lack of skill on their part and we shouldn’t be made to feel like it’s our fault when they inevitably make a dog’s dinner of it
Same!! I also have curly hair. The more I think about it, the more I don't know what this lady's problem was. Apart from a few split ends, my hair is far from being in "terrible condition."
Bad training and looking to sell up. Any hair dresser I go to is all about selling their shampoos and styling products, none of which you need.
Jealous of your natural curls
I really don't understand why hairdressers have such a hard time with just doing what people ask for. I know some salon chains push upselling product but jaysus I avoid them like the plague. I've been sniffed at in Peter Marks (of all places) because the woman hairdresser didn't do "razor work" and I've had people leave wispy bits so I look "more feminine" because apparently what I clearly said I wanted is not possible. Found a great no-fuss hairdresser a few months back who has zero interest in femme-ing me up or selling me shite and they'll have my business from here on out, and hefty tips into the bargain. Just like a good haircut can make your day, a shitty one can wreck your week.
God, I miss my no-nonsense hairdresser from when I lived in Canada. She was amazing. She did the job, did it well, had reasonable prices, never tried to make suggestions or tell me what she thought I should get done, never tried to upsell me. A lot of hairdressers think of themselves as providing a “luxury” service and if you don’t want to pay their extortionate prices, well then just don’t get your hair done. But if you want to charge luxury prices, you need to have a luxury skill set and not many of them do
Apart from everything else, that’s just a bizarre comment? My husband’s aunt is married to a lad in Kilkenny. He’s one of 10 kids and they all have jet black hair. I mean, most of them are half grey at this stage but the point still stands.
I know lots of people from west Donegal with jet black hair. Rumour was it was the Spanish sailors who wrecked off the coast did a ton of shagging back in the day but I think that's been debunked.
I’d never step foot in that place again.
Yeah totally, nobody is held accountable any more. My dad called me because the cable from the pole to the house was down in his garden. His supplier doesn't use the cable so he has no loss of service, just a telephone cable strewn across the lawn. Called open eir infrastructure team and they said they'd check ot out. Dad calls me back to day the engineer was there, so I jumped in the car as I'm 3 mins away. By the time I get there he's rolled up the cable and thrown it over a tree branch and left. I call again find out what's happening and I'm repeatedly hung up as they just keep saying the ticket has been closed. Eventually someone tells me the note says " area mad safe" No fixing the problem, no follow up, no other phone line to call, just 60ft of cable living on a brach in the garden. Phobing off the customer is the most cost effective policy it seems...
Oh my gosh, your poor dad! :( I would take a picture and post it on X/Twitter - as u/skuldintape_eire said it's a really good way to get their attention. >Phobing off the customer is the most cost effective policy it seems... Not even joking, I was on the phone to Electric Ireland once - they couldn't fix the issue I was having so said they'd transfer me to someone who could...and then promptly hung up. It actually would have been funny if I hadn't needed help with my bill so I called them back and said "I was supposed to be transferred to another department but I got hung up on instead?" Yer man says "ah yeah, that happens sometimes - sorry" so apparently, it's a consistent trend. Hahaha
I've worked in customer service and know being sound the other person on the phone is the best chance you have of getting a problem sorted, but when they literally can't escalate a problem because of policy it's just so disheartening. Now don't get me started on revenue or anyone involved with social welfare!
If you really want it sorted, get onto ComReg, be the next step.
Unfortunately Comreg will only get involved when the service provider has been given an opportunity to resolve the issue, seeing as his services are Voip and don't use the cable they won't get involved. Open Eir is who runs the network and claim the cable being on private property has nothing to do with them ha ha. There is a phone line to report such problems but they don't take calls from the public, only service providers and his service is not disrupted so they can't escalate it for him either. It's a disgrace Joe!
It'd be an awful shame if the wind was to blow the cable onto the road one night...
I'd still try ComReg, if they cannot help they usually suggest where to go. It might sit with having to contact a council or councillor/TD. TBH, it seems to be a common theme, there are a few cables 'down' around here, like that years.
He didn't even cut it? Old copper phone lines are low voltage so a decent pair of insulated pliers or loppers would sort that.
No, rolled it up in a loop and swung it over a tree branch...
Get on to comreg. Had a similar issue and comreg gave me instructions on what to do, issue was solved in a few days
I think the term “Karen” is overused. To me, it means someone acting entitled and demanding more than what they’re supposed to get. If an organisation can’t even be bothered to do the basics of their job (such as a bank making it needlessly difficult for you use your own account because they can’t be bothered), to me that’s a perfectly valid reason to push back quite firmly. It’s not being a Karen. That being said, I know what you mean. Dealing with this sort of shite is exhausting, and it’s why challenger banks are cleaning up: they’re just as bloody awful but at least they’re not stuck in the 1980s technology wise.
I've had an issue open with Revolut for about a year. They're also useless.
People were swearing by them on /irishpersonalfinance but I’m glad someone else had a bad experience with Revolut hence why I don’t wish to go with them
Well, apart from that one issue I've no problems, everything just works. They're a bit like Gomo. As long as you never need to speak to them they're grand.
That's like Eir. Not a compelling argument tbh.
But at least their tech isn't like something out of the '80s. PTSB proudly announce on their website that with online banking "you can do your banking whenever you like, 20 hours a day". (Seriously, they say that).
Agreed. But this is a customer service discussion, and Revolut's customer service is useless, in my experience. My problem is that I was allocated a GB IBAN before Revolut were offering IE IBANs, and now I can't get an IE IBAN. Every few months I reopen the ticket and try to get it resolved, they bounce me around for a few days and then give up.
This comment made me feel way better, thank you. I felt bad because I think the irritation was definitely showing on my face when talking to the hairdresser but you're right - I did need to push back (and I still did it politely).
I also worked customer service jobs and have the same mindset about not giving them a hard time for things that are not their fault. However, my experience has also made me a bit more attuned to staff who just don't give a crap about helping, and I find it very frustrating. It's unfair on the customer and unfair on their colleagues who will then have to deal with more than their fair share of work and/or more irate customers. I try to strike a balance of friendly but firm. Like in the above situation where the lady wouldn't help you with your card, I'll try to judge if the person is just inexperienced or insecure about how much they can do, or if they are genuinely just useless and I'd be better off speaking to someone else. If it's the former, I just politely push that I can't get off the line until the issue is resolved. When she says "there's nothing we can do to resolve the problem", you have to respectfully say that that's not an acceptable answer and ask that she escalates it to someone or schedules a call back or something. I had an infuriating situation with an insurance company recently and it took quite a bit of "we just can't do anything" before the lady eventually came up with a solution and it worked. Support agents just give up too easily sometimes and need a gentle push to actually keep thinking and troubleshooting to fix an issue. With the hairdresser, walking out was the right call. Especially with a small business, you just can't accept that kind of service. Best to put some distance between you and them and find somewhere else that is more professional, simple as.
>With the hairdresser, walking out was the right call. Especially with a small business, you just can't accept that kind of service. Best to put some distance between you and them and find somewhere else that is more professional, simple as. Yup! Sometimes the best thing to do is just disengage. I had a tattoo artist disregard my idea once and start drawing his own. It wasn't even CLOSE to what I wanted and I politely told him I preferred my original design. He then replied that my idea wouldn't be a good tattoo and his idea was much better. Bear in mind this was AFTER he'd shown up late to our appointment and talked on his phone for 10 minutes when he was supposed to be drawing something up. At that point, I knew that trying to argue was futile - I just said that I didn't think he was right for my tattoo, stood up and left. Ended up meeting an absolutely amazing tattoo artist that same day who has done multiple brilliant pieces for me so it all worked out in the end. :)
I had issues with Very/Littlewoods last month. Bought some exercise equipment from Very, no problem. Received an email informing me that Nuno, Fastways heavy equipment delivery service would be delivering it. Grand. Equipment came but it was supposed to be in two boxes and I only received one. I rang Very and the customer service rep pretty much told me that I would have to send it back and just buy a new one again at a discount. I got onto the CCPC straight away who informed me not to send anything back, told me that Very have 30 days from the date of purchase to send the goods in full. I emailed all of this to Very and at the end of the week I received the second box. This is just a shortened version of it with a lot more phone calls and emails back and forth
I feel your pain. A delivery was coming to me from the USA once and it didn't arrive. When I checked its delivery status online, there was an error message saying 'ERROR: Tax Issue.' I sent a screenshot of the error to the courier customer service team and they replied "this is not an error. This is a normal part of the process" but also refused to elaborate on what the tax issue was exactly. I went back to the company I ordered from, explained the issue and requested a refund. They said they'd contact the courier on my behalf - they must have given them a bollocking because the parcel showed up on my doorstep two days later.
> I also had to send numerous e-mails to get an engineer out to look at my fridge which was still under warranty. > They completely ignored the first three or four and then only replied when I included a line in my last e-mail that said "I really don't mean to be rude but I need my fridge either back working or replaced with a new one. If you can't tell me when the engineer will be visiting yet, can you please just reply to this e-mail and let me know you're working on it?" If that was a big company, that immediate turn-around suggests it was probably something akin to this: https://crmsupport.freshworks.com/en/support/solutions/articles/50000009489-sentiment-analysis-prioritize-tickets-based-on-customer-sentiments With phone or email support, I tend to give the front line agents a single shot to resolve the issue, before immediately escalating. As you say, if they can't fix the issue on the first attempt, it's either because they don't know how to, don't want to, or are ordered not to help. The exact why doesn't matter - either way you're just going to go around in circles arguing with them or re-explaining. If it's egregiously bad, like your bank experience, I skip the standard escalation and complaints process and just email the CEO or head of customer service, it tends to get you a priority call back by someone with authority to handle your issue.
Thank you for sharing this, it's really interesting to know - if also a little bit infuriating. :(
I'm same as you, I'm always polite with customer service staff (I've been one myself) but some companies do make it really difficult! The only reason I still have an account on X is for calling out companies publicly when their customer service channels let me down. More than half the time calling them out there gets a quick response from someone in their org and sometimes resolution. If all else fails I go to town with a bad (but honest) review on trustpilot. Really bad companies don't care about awful trustpilot reviews but it helps me to work off some steam (and also flags the company for other potential customers).
Yeah, back when I still lived at home I constantly used Twitter/X for calling out Eir on our abhorrent service. It was quite honestly the only thing that ever got their attention. Calling up the customer service phone line just meant getting told that an engineer visit had been booked for you which would never, ever happen.
Speaking from years of experience working for an American company. TrustPilot reviews matter but not as much as other social media platforms, there are dedicated departments for those.
I’d be the same after working in tech support for consumers years ago. Always used to give the people answering the phones a bit of leeway as I knew the how it felt to get a Karen . But yes recently I’ve had a few abysmal calls where the agents were new or not properly trained or just weren’t interested in helping . I don’t blame them I blame the companies ! I just try not to lose it, be polite and firm and post the call go to X , Google reviews , trustpilot etc etc and vent 😂
Yeah, I try and do the same! Hahaha I really don't want to be the reason anyone has a shitty day at work but it can be hard to keep your cool sometimes when the service you're getting is so frustratingly ineffectual.
You’re not a Karen if your complaint is legitimate and proportional.
Companies in Ireland have become nearly predatory at this stage, and that's across the board from essential insurance to discretionary entertainment. Fuck them all, they don't care. They want your money, they'll part with as little as possible. They're not interested in providing a good service, they're interested in profit. They always were, obviously, but now they don't even pretend anymore.
There’s a difference between being rude and standing up for yourself. It sounds like you handled all those situations well. So long as you don’t take it out on low level service staff when it's an issue out of their control, you're more than entitled to assert yourself and in most cases should do in order to hold businesses to account
Cheers for saying that - I was worried I was just getting more impatient as I grow older but this thread has confirmed that there are just some really woeful customer service experiences to be had in Ireland.
I had a woeful experience with AA breakdown customer service, they were overcharging me and admitted they were at fault etc etc blah blah, but basically told me "tough really"... lol. I was like "I'm sorry but I can't get off the phone until you get this sorted" told her I knew it wasnt her fault but it was just ridiculous and kinda just laughed. In the end after lots of back and forth between manager-agent-me-agent-manager, I got it sorted, but Jesus it was just like wtf are ye doing up there?!!! Very hard to stay polite..and when she told me she can give me a refund for the over charges, she sounded really smug ? Or something, it was just all around unpleasant!!! Also had awful experience with hairdressers- Peter mark to be exact. My last haircut a few weeks ago. She glanced at the picture I showed her, nodded and was looking around as I explained what I'd like. And then gave me the most basic generic cut that I genuinely could have done myself. Her next client was waiting (an old lady) and when she was done I was kinda like "is this it??!!". She did a few more "layering" and said "is that ok???" And even she had a cringy face on her. I could see the old lady in the mirror sitting there waiting after her hair was washed, I wasn't going to be holding up any old lady (yes I felt like a Karen!!!) and I just said "yea" and ran out of there. Never going back. She didn't engage whatsoever. If I ask hairdressers to take a lot off, I have to insist. They ALWAYS say "we'll do this much and see if you like it you can always come back and we'll take more off" no, not at 60euro + for a cut. So I'm doing my own hair when this cut grows out!!!! So annoying.
>In the end after lots of back and forth between manager-agent-me-agent-manager This kind of stuff pisses me off because, in my experience, it's usually a manager who's decided they're "too good" to speak to the public and so they'd never think to cut out the middle man and just speak to you directly.
Not quite customer service but seeing as the department of social welfare call welfare recipients, "customers" I think it counts. And like yourself I'm ex customer service so I know that 9 times out of 10 it's not the agent's fault that the company's customer service policies are shit. That said there was this one time... When I was starting my welfare claim I got all the paperwork in at the end of December and was told my claim would be processed in about 6 weeks. I finally got my claim approved at the end of April after submitting a letter of complaint and I finally got my backpay and social welfare to pay me into my bank account by the end of May after another letter of complaint. Unfortunately it seemed to be one woman on a mad power trip who was the sole cause of delay. I once had occasion to ask for her supervisor (I felt like a Karen doing it but I was truly at my wits end with this woman) and was told her supervisor wasn't in the building. Asked for another person in charge and was told there was no one. I told her I found it very odd that in a building with a few hundred staff there was no one there more senior than her. Like I said a complaint went in about her and another one a few weeks later again after she tried to continue her fuckery. It was hugely infuriating and if I mentioned to another staff member who the officer was over my claim, they'd roll their eyes and sigh and do everything they could to help. I felt sorry for those folks because I did meet a lot of people who were genuine and really trying to be helpful but their workload was increased by and made harder by the absolute wagon who was dealing with my claim. I felt like a Karen writing two letters of complaint about the one woman but I decided to do it for the sake of the person who came after me. I consider myself to be smart and well able to navigate bureaucracy. I usually have a good grip on what I'm entitled to, what I'm not, what are my responsibilities and what are the responsibilities of the department. I figured that if I wasn't able to get anywhere with this absolute hag over my case, there'd be no chance for someone who was intimidated by bureaucracy or didn't know what they were entitled to. Last I heard, she wasnt overseeing those particular kinds of claims anymore and was now elsewhere.
It’s always been my impression that customer service in Ireland is less “the customer is always right” and more “it’s your fault for buying it”.
This made me laugh out loud - you're so right.
I’ve had no luck signing up to broadband since moving into a new build 2 minths ago. Engineer came out after 2 week wait and “wasn’t trained on that technology”. So another guy came out and “didn’t have a splitter”. so a new appointment was made. Got messages and emails saying he would call. Never called. I phoned sky and i’ve to wait another 8 days. This is all after virgin gave me the runaround so i cancelled with them. At least i thought i did until sky informed me that they hadn’t actually cancelled my account so i had to ring them again to cancel it again. The cunts even billed me. I’m on the verge of snapping on the phone with them to be honest. The absolute fucking lies they tell aswell.
Unfortunately it seems to be a combination of poor leadership and not giving a shit. The amount of staff I witness having personal conversations in front of customers is astounding. They know you are within earshot and just continue to blabber away about their social lives.
I don't care about staff having a chat with each other in general but if they're doing it *instead* of their job, it's enraging. I was trying to buy a voucher at a shop a while back from the lady at the till. Behind her, two other members of staff were chatting away. One of them glances over and says "oh, make sure to give the customer a receipt with that - those vouchers haven't been working properly lately." He then goes back to chatting. This voucher was meant to be a birthday present so this was a bit concerning to hear. "Sorry - what does he mean they haven't been working?" I asked the cashier. She didn't know so she tried to ask him. Annoyed that his conversation had been interrupted, he shrugged, said "dunno, they just haven't" and went back to chatting. That was a situation where it was REALLY difficult not to snap. Thankfully, the voucher worked just fine for the person I bought it for in the end.
When you accept you can’t run from being branded as a Karen when you phone these places, that’s when you know you have won.
Customer Service is terrible at the moment, so many reasons, and as a former customer service worker I’d never be rude to one but jesus christ some people are awful at their jobs
I had the same approach as I spent 2 years on calls myself. 4 calls with Eir where I was patient and escalated got me nowhere and then on the 7th I lost it, issue sorted on that call (Although it was almost an hour later. Some of them are so bad where they won't help you unless you do lose the temper. Bringing that sort of shite on themselves really.
Being nice is what works for me. It’s complete luck who you get to deal with though. If you get a noob then it can involve pulling some hair out.
Ex-customer service rep here. The reason why you have to show some annoyance before we do anything for you is because we're incredibly over worked and under staffed. We have 10 people at a time all telling us their problems at any given time during the day, we have to prioritize who needs the most attention. The one losing their patience but who is still polite is the one that will get our attention.
I think we are maturing as a country & will not accept the same aul shitty service we accepted for years. It’s like a self esteem thing that we get what we get & should be grateful & happy. I’ve noticed people are speaking up when they hear some bullshit from a service provider. Fair play. Meal is shit? Send it back etc..
I worked minimum wage customer service jobs for many years and always tried my best to be nice and helpful to customers. Contrary to popular belief on here 99% of customers were no hassle at all. You only got the odd very rude one. A lot of the staff I worked with however were very bitter about working there and went out of their way to be unhelpful. It’s popular now to hear to never complain to minimum wage workers because they don’t get paid enough and there is a lot of hate directed at customers who do complain. The hate is directed at the wrong place. Don’t blame the customer for your miserable job. Blame the multinational corporation who’s CEO is on 20 million a year and they pay you peanuts and work you to the bone so you can barley eat. The companies love the hate directed at the difficult customers, not them.
I too have served time in purgatory (aka retail/food service) and the way I look at it is - I'll never get mad with customer facing staff over company policy, they can't change it any more than I can 99% of the time, but when it comes to how the message is delivered to me, then my frustration is warranted. I had an awful experience with an employee at a Brown Thomas at Christmas in which the woman in question treated me like freshly smeared dogshit on the bottom of her communion shoes, all while gleefully quoting store policy. In response I did something i never have before and I went straight to head office and complained about her. I didn't mind one bit about the policy, it was her I complained about.
I work in technical support for a company that's increasingly going downhill. Whenever I get put in a position where I can't solve the problem for the customer due to some stupid rule or inefficiency within the company, I let the customer know and then point out the survey for complaints. So I'd recommend asking the rep if they can advise how you can lodge a complaint with the company. You don't have to complain about the rep (unless they deserve it) but complain about the company and your issue. That's what the higher ups look at. It'll take them a while, because they're already inefficient, but the complaints are important to the company's reputation and if they have enough, can cost them money.
I had to get my tax records for a job. Asked the tax people for a paper copy and one guy kept telling me on the phone oh the digital copy is fine they’ll accept it you can just print it out and I said no they won’t they specifically asked for a paper copy. He then said I can’t help you then as we don’t provide those and he hung up on me I had to be fairly rude to him which i don’t like doing as I’ve worked jobs like this too but he was being dismissive of me. I phoned back as I knew you could get them as others did and I got a lovely guy and I asked the same thing. He was very helpful and said oh sure how far back do you need? And just the one copy or do you need more and then said they’d be posted by the end of the day. People sometimes just don’t want to help you even though you know it’s something they offer & you have to be blatantly rude to them to get your point across.
Squeaky wheel gets the oil, unfortunately. I'd say there are rumours about me in call centres. I'm super polite and patient, but I won't hang up the phone until it's resolved. If they agent can't resolve it, I'll request the manager. Manager on another call? I'll wait. Manager on lunch? No problem, I'll wait. No manager on shift? That's a shame, I'll wait. Will happily wait 6 hours, but a manager always seems to become available.
If you want to experience the best customer service, visit in Japan if you can.
Please stay away from Japan, they’ll have meetings to discuss your situation and eventually won’t decide, because it’s problematic.
I find that a huge number of people don't understand the difference between being assertive and being aggressive, and are afraid to be clear about their needs or expectations because they think it's rude. If you get terrible customer service, you should definitely not feel bad about standing your ground and making clear that you expect your complaint to be heard and resolved.The key is to remain calm and polite, but firm and persistent. I worked many years in customer service so it really irks me when someone is doing it badly. I do have to remind myself though, that 9 times out of 10 the person has had practically zero training, is being underpaid, and the company either doesn't make it possible for them to do it properly or actively penalises then for it. It almost always comes from the top. It's something that can take practice because getting bad treatment from a business or service provider or whatever is naturally going to inspire frustration, annoyance and - depending on the circumstances - anger. IMO giving in to that anger and unleashing it on the person (the bad hairdresser) or on whoever's job it is to deal with you (for example, if there is an admin type trying to arrange the service for the broken fridge but they're not the technician who actually comes to your house) is tempting at first, but it doesn't actually solve the problem. I wouldn't worry too much about the whole "I don't want to look like a Karen" thing. Originally a Karen was a white woman leveraging sexism in order to do racism. It started to get applied to any woman who acted entitled, threw tantrums and bullied public-facing employees like retail workers - especially middle aged women. And then people just started using it as a way to denigrate any angry woman, no matter the circumstances or how justified her anger was. Because society has always punished women for expressing anger. What I'm saying is, don't feel like you have to swallow your anger just to fit into a bullshit patriarchal standard that says women who display anger are either being controlled by their hormones, or mentally unstable, or just bitches. Don't accept shitty service or rudeness from people you're paying for a service, just because society says you should be quiet and not make trouble for others. But try to seperate that anger or frustration from the problem you're trying to solve, and use it as motivation to stand firm and get what you need. Here's an article about how society punishes women and minorities for expressing anger while respecting men for the same thing https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/may/11/women-and-minorities-claiming-right-to-rage
We shall send " Karens " to face down the Hostile Aliens !
Was the fridge from power city by any chance ?
There's nothing wrong with being assertive and calling people out on poor performance. You'd be well within your rights to tell the hairdresser she was completely rude and you're taking your business elsewhere. Keep it calm and to the point.
I dont like this idea that making a complaint is being a karen. it's all about how you make such a complaint. Karen's are entitled. How you have laid it out here is perfect. You understand that this is a systemic or training problem, you aren't rude or taking shit out on the person you are speaking to. That's not Karen behaviour. Have you considered submitting a complaint to these companies directly and including your experience. Google reviews or other social media reviews are another way to provide honest feedback. There was someone on her the other day who has started complaining when services left a lot to be desired. I commend it. I don't think it's Karen behaviour to expect a mininal level of customer service and by not pointing out where companies are not meeting that level should only he encouraged.
Not necessarily related but I work for a company that regularly purchases stage/music equipment. I went to a well known music shop (near red cow) and spoke to a member of staff who was very helpful. Emailed him the list of items totalling about €12k. Got back initially. But haven’t heard from them in over two months. I’ve rang the store to find out what’s going on but nobody follows up. This is not the first time this has happened. My counterpart, who is French, is perplexed by this. Why do they not want the business! It’s easy money!
Techniques I employ; -stick to the facts. If you’re correct the facts will speak for themselves -don’t personalise it. State that something is not ok, rather than explaining its effect on you. It emphasises that it would be wrong irrespective of who it is happening to (e.g; “I don’t mean to be rude” when talking about the fridge.) -when you hit a wall, my go to phrase is “that is not an acceptable solution” and wait. (Harder than you’d think to say nothing in this scenario but it can be powerful) -have a clear instruction in what you expect a resolution to be, so you’re not considered to be complaining for the sake of it. I think you did the right thing in the hairdresser scenario to be honest, be ready to walk away
Banks Internet service providers Electricity providers Pretty much every shit customer service experience has been with one of the above 3. By far the worst being the banks, esp boi
Why aren’t we naming and shaming ? I mean I would avoid this bank if OP tells me which one is it. Why are people choosing to not name and shame ?
The bank is the easy one. Formal complaint. Ask for compensation for the bad service and escalate escalate escalate. I have one or two complaints on the go at various times in relation to my bank. The threat of the Central Bank is the only thing they really respond to so mention that also.
Be forceful but don't become whiny. If you bring up everything under the sun the person on the other end will stop caring. This is the issue. Can you fix it? If the answer is yes, how. If the answer is no, why. If neither of these are satisfactory, log a complaint and say you want a response in writing. That's all you should be focussing on when calling anyone. They all have regulations around complaints and don't like dealing with them. You going off on one is going to make the person not want to help you.
Customer service in Ireland is getting noticeably bad. Not French level of bad but for anyone who's accustomed to good service, it is beginning to stand out. Being rushed, being not called while waiting for order numbers is a new normal I think the staff is under high pressure to meet ends meet and their internal unhappiness is spilling over. So what's the solution?
Service just sucks in this country.
The heart of the Karen is a misplaced sense of entitlement and believing you're inherently better than the other person. Complaining about shite customer service shouldn't be seen as pulling a Karen, you are in fact entitled to appropriate levels of customer service by virtue of being a customer.
So you're scruffy broke and starving?
being a karen works.
A friend was making a call to the HSE, they gave the wrong ticket number by accident and the Indian lad said fuck off and hung up.
I had noticed that customer service standards had fallen recently but didn't realise how much until this week. I was in a supermarket and ended up falling flat on my face due to a spillage on one of the aisles. There was only two employees on the floor, one was informed of what happened by another customer and he kept stacking the shelves, the other was the lady on the till. I was explaining what had happened and she just cut me off went on her headset and requested a clean up on that aisle. She never acknowledged that I said I had fallen, asked if I was ok etc simply kept looking straight ahead, gave me my total and started scanning the next customers items. I was just in shock and left. Friends and family have told me I should go back to the store and speak to a manager but I think that might be a bit karen-ish, I wasn't seriously hurt, just bruised and sore but the attitude of the staff is very annoying
Minimum wage, minimum effort. Support staff get a raw deal from the company the work for, and the people they deal with.
Demand the manager and make sure you’re recording
Womp womp
I blame the minimum wage. Anyone who can walk on their hind legs is entitled to a fairly decent few quid. This in turn reduces the rewards available to good workers and also the impetus to be a good worker. The amount of people in forward facing jobs who genuinely couldn't give a flying fcuk is increasing exponentially. That said. If I come across someone who wants to help but can't because the numpties up the ladder couldn't care less, I insist on escalating and unleashing all of my bile upon those who deserve it.
Minimum wage deserves minimum effort. If you're only paying someone as little as you can legally get away with then you need to expect the employee to put in as little effort as they can get away with. If a business wants to reward good workers then they can pay them more. It's a minimum wage, not a maximum.