Customer Service

Let me start off by saying that this is not intended to offend anyone in particular, but it is my personal commentary on customer service.

I own a Jabra bluetooth wireless headset. When I checked my receipt last week it turns out I have owned this headset for a little more than 13 months. That fact becomes important in a minute. Last week while driving down the freeway my headset started beeping at me and cutting out. It turns out the charger was only charging intermittently and the headset was running out of power.

Now a wireless headset is important to me for several reasons, not the least of these being that it is now illegal in California to talk on the phone while driving unless you are using a hands free device. I spend a lot of time in my car and I utilize my drive time to catch up with family and friends as well as return calls to clients and colleagues.

So after determining that my charger was not charging properly and having no luck with either the owner's manual or the online tech support in determining if there was a reset or other means of resolving my problem I called Jabra. The phone was answered by a pleasant sounding young lady with a distinct Indian accent, I have since referred to her as Ms. New Dehli. Insensitive I know but in my experience fairly accurate. The young lady was helpful when I explained my problem. It turns out that my headset is no longer in production, it is "outdated" but, she had the replacement charger in stock and could send it out that day. So for double the actual price, to include shipping charges, she sent out the charger.

The charger arrived today. What Ms. New Dehli failed to discuss with me was the fact that the charger is actually two pieces, the cord and the cradle. I opened the package and plugged the cord into the old cradle with the same result I was having last week. So I called Jabra. Guess whose fault it is that I didn't get a complete charger. Of course, it's my fault. I was told that it wasn't Ms. New Dehli's fault that I had read my manual, and looked online, and did not find anything that listed the cord and cradle as two separate components. I was somehow supposed to know that.

So after raising my objection with Ms. New Hampshire, who assured me Ms. New Dehli works in the same building with her in New Hampshire, I have paid for a new cradle which is being shipped, without shipping charge, today.

Now, in addition to problems with people handling phonecalls, both in technical support and customer service, who do not speak, or understand, English well enough to handle the job I have another issue. My Jabra headset comes with a one year warranty. I purchased my Jabra headset thirteen months ago, it has been out of warranty for barely one month. During the first year I had one issue with the headset which was handeld with a ten minute call to technical support. But now that the warranty has expired I have an issue that can only be resolved by me buying not one, but two separate items which in the original packaging come together.

So, I want to know when did customer service become more about placing orders for new purchases rather than actually addressing and handling a customer's concerns? Any thoughts.

Memories

A friend of mine shared this on her blog and it sounds fun.

1. Leave one memory that you and I had together as a comment on my blog. It doesn't matter if you know me a little or a lot, anything you remember!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty funny to see the responses.

Memories

Yesterday while driving down the freeway I was passed by a man on a motorcycle, most likely a Harley. Not an uncommon occurrence. I live in an area where the Harley, and other motorcycles, have become the midlife crisis toy of choice for many of the area residents.

But this man was different than the doctor, dentist or other professional who rides on the weekends and occasionally to the office. This man was wearing a denim jacket with the sleeves cut off and his "colors" prominently displayed on his back. Across the top, in an arch, it read "HESSIANS", on the bottom was some other lettering, probably his city name or other affiliation identification.

My first thought was that I have not seen a "Hessian" in years. The second thought was I wonder where Johnny Raeburn is today.

During elementary school my family lived in North Las Vegas, Nevada. Our next door neighbors on the left were the Raeburns. Johnny and I were about the same age and despite being in the same grade I don't think we were ever in the same class. Johnny was not really a friend, but he was a neighbor and my age so we often played together. Johnny just played different games than other kids. Games like, how far can you throw the cat, and can you run across the Smith's backyard without getting caught, and one of Johnny's all time favorites had to be, how many matches does it take to light the Jones' garage on fire?

Johnny was a rebel, a troublemaker, a kid who by 5th grade announced to me that when he grew up he wanted to be a "Hessian", a biker. So yesterday when I saw that biker's back as he passed me with his "colors" proudly displayed I thought of Johnny and for a minute wondered if he was still alive.

Now most people, who didn't grow up in the Las Vegas area in the 1960's, don't remember or even know who the Hessians are. In my memory they were a motorcycle gang which rivaled the Hell's Angels. At least in the Las Vegas area.

I'm sure that if we thought about it, every day we come across something which awakens a long forgotten childhood memory. Until yesterday I hadn't thought of Johnny Raeburn or his family in probably 20 years. But when I started to think of him I remembered a lot of things, like the time he enlisted me to help him break into a neighbor's garage and steal a lawn mower engine so he could use it on his mini-bike. That little caper didn't end well. Johnny threatened me with my life if I told anyone and then he had his older brother call me on the phone and pretend to be a juvenile probation officer. I spilled my guts and Johnny didn't kill me, but he beat me up pretty good.

By 8th grade Johnny no longer lived at home. If I remember correctly he went to live at a Boy's Ranch for 12 to 24 months. We moved away before he came home.

What?

So, I've been married for more than 20 years and almost montholy I wonder, HOW!!??

Tonight's just another good example. My wife, who is all but computer illiterate, asks me to take an invitation she recieved in an email last month and adapt it for her use. Easy, right? I guess if you're the IT guy for a living. But, me, I'm the guy who uses the computer primarily for word processing, checking email, writing this exciting, engaging blog and other similar projects. I get harassed by a few of my friends who recently learned that I don't have excel, so I can't open their wonderful spread sheets. I keep reminding them, I'M NOT AN ACCOUNTANT!!

Anyway, back to the issue at hand. I got frustrated because I wasn't able to make the font bigger for my wife's invitations. Not only did I get frustrated but I made the mistake of expressing my frustration. So, I'm sitting here at my computer while my wife is out looking for a video to watch tomorrow, hopefully while I am out of the house at work. Now that's another story.

Today my wife had a stack of offbeat videos to watch. Let be back up first. My wife is off work recovering from outpatient surgery on Monday. She will return to work next Monday but in the meantime she is catching up on some movies she's wanted to watch.

So this afternoon I was at my desk working and my wife asked if I would like to join her and watch a movie. I have a laptop and could work with that while I watched the movie so I joined her. The first was just silly and offbeat, I thought it was fun. Then she brought out her last choice. One that we had already discussed that she whould watch without me. It's called, "Year of the Dog", starring Molly Shannon. Now I'm not a fan of Molly Shannon. I think she stayed about five years to long on Saturday Night Live and nothing she's done since then has been funny or interesting to me.

Anyway, this movie is Molly Shannon's pet project to promote her political point of view. I found it offensive as well as boring.

So, this is probably something I shouldn't post but I'll take my chances.

Fourth of July

Each year as th 4th of July approaches I remember different experiences from years past. As a young child I remember sitting in the stands at Cashman Field in Las Vegas, with my family, watching the fireworks. As a teenager we sat on the beach at Port Hueneme, California, and watched as fireworks were shot off a barge floating out past the end of the pier.

Despite all those memories one that always comes to the forefront is July 4th 1976. At that time I was 19 years old and living in Valencia Spain. I had a roommate, Phillip, who was also from southern California. I remember waking up on the 4th of July and complaining to him that all of the United States was celebrating the bicentennial that day and here I was half way around the world. Life was unfair!

As was his way Phillip quietly went about the morning without responding to my complaints. Finally, as we had left our apartment and walked to the bus stop Phillip had had enough. As we stood on the sidewalk waiting for the bus Phillip spoke to me in a quiet voice, almost a whisper. "David, turn around", he said, "look where you are standing." Turning around I looked at the front of a cathedral which we passed every day. "So," I began, "it's the cathedral, so what?" Then with great patience Phillip asked me to read the placque next to the front door fo the cathedral.

I was a little surprised, for more than a month I had walked past that cathedral every day, I had noticed its architecture and detailed craftsmanship, but I had missed the little placque. I don't remember anything else but one line, "dedicated, June 2, 1365".

The rest of the day anytime I started to think about missing all the bicentennial celebrations at "home", I reminded myself that while I was missing that celebration I had an opportunity to experience world history. To be in buildings that had been erected long before the United States were even discovered, let alone organized. It didn't make me any less patriotic, or unAmerican, but it helped me gain a little perspective.

The only other thing I remember about that say is that evening. The Ice Capades were touring Europe that summer and on that evening, July 4, 1976, they were in Valencia. Phillip and I were in that audience, experiencing something which at that time was purely American.

I am grateful for the opportunity I had to learn, at that young age, that there are other important cultures and societies in the world, more importantly, there is history, important history, which predates our own.

National pride is not unique to the United States. I awoke one morning in Valencia and looked out my window to a sea of young men, soldiers, camped in a field across from my apartment close to the harbor. It was almost scary. A little while later, as I left the apartment to begin my workday I heard a small group of voices begin to sing, "Que Viva Espana", within a minute another group joined in and before I had walked a block I heard the entire field singing, "Que Viva Espana". I am sure that in each country around the world there have been similar experiences.

This Fourth of July, and every day, I am proud to be an American. But, I am also mindful, and proud to be a citizen of the world.