Illustration by Istvan Banyai
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Consumer Guide: Fighting Back
By Ron Burley, March & April 2007
Sometimes you need to be a bully to get what you deserve
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My wife, Hali, hopped out of her car smiling.
"Don't the tires look great?" she said proudly, pointing to
the brand-new set. "I know you told me to get Michelins, but the salesman
said these are just as good." I eyed the crummy knockoffs and realized
Hali had been duped. These tires were to Michelins what canned tuna is to
caviar. So I called Mitch, the manager of the store, and nicely asked him to
install the correct ones. "Can't do that once she's left the
premises," he said. "It's our policy."
He tossed out the phrase like a grenade, assuming it would scare me away.
But after nearly 20 years of working as a consumer reporter and dealing with
Mitches, I wasn't going to back down so easily. Policy or no, I knew I was
in the right. So it was time to do something that most of us are too tired, too
scared, or too uninformed to do. It was time to fight back.
I hung up the phone, went to my study, and cut an ad from the yellow pages.
I photocopied it 12 times, stapled a $20 bill to each copy, and put the stack
in a Manila folder. Ten minutes later I walked into the tire store and asked
for Mitch. A burly guy looked up. "That's me," he said.
I explained who I was and again asked for my tires. Mitch smirked.
"I'd like to help, but I told you, we have a policy."
"Mitch," I said sweetly, "I'm here with a simple, fair
request. If you can't fulfill it"—I pulled out my folder and
glanced at the line of waiting customers—"I'll tell all of these
people what happened this afternoon. I'll hand each of them a copy of your
competitor's ad and ask them if, for 20 bucks, they wouldn't mind going
across the street for their tires."
Mitch's mouth dropped open.
"It may cost me a few dollars," I continued pleasantly. "But
I'll feel better knowing I saved some folks from getting ripped
off."
Mitch looked at the waiting customers.
"So," I said. "Should we see how much business I can hand
your competitor today?"
Mitch looked me straight in the eye and smiled thinly. "I'm sorry
for the misunderstanding," he said. "Please have your wife pull her
car around. We'll take care of her right away."
Years ago I never would have been so bold. I would have dealt with Mitch the
way we're taught to deal with consumer issues: by writing a letter or
having my attorney write one. Older Americans especially feel shy about
speaking up when confronted with consumer injustice. We believe that if we go
through the proper channels, our issues will be resolved. It's no wonder:
50 years ago the average household dealt with only a few businesses—the
grocery store, the butcher—and most were locally owned with a vested
interest in the community. When these companies messed up, they fessed up and
solved the problem. Today we deal with cell phone companies, cable providers,
health clubs—national chains with no reason to value individual
customers. Proof that consumers are increasingly getting the short end of the
service stick? In 2005 more than 400,000 fraud-related complaints were filed
with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), compared with just 16,500 in 1996.
The good news is, you don't have to play that wimpy role of powerless
customer. That incident with the tires was my light bulb moment—now, I
give seminars on how to deal with situations where businesses take advantage of
honest customers. The better news is, there's a tool kit of simple tips
that anyone can use to slice through voice mail, cut through red tape, and get
through to guys like Mitch. Here's how you can fight back and get what you
deserve.
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1. KNOW WHEN TO FIGHT
Remember this: Your time is money. Resolving a business dispute
should never cost more than what the bungled product or the service is
worth.
The short answer: if you're in the right, you should never take no for
an answer. But it can get more complicated than that. Before you go to the mat,
make sure it's worth your time—and I'm talking worth literally,
in dollars and cents. For example, I value my free time at $100 an hour (steep,
I know, but free time is worth more to me than work time). If I'm going to
chase down a $40 mistake on my cable bill, I had better be able to resolve it
in less than 25 minutes. Set your own rate, and then stick to it. Also,
remember to factor in hidden costs: you may win the war against a $5 bank
overcharge, but if the battles cost you $10 in parking meters and gasoline, you
actually lose. Time to pay up and consider finding a new bank. But you'll
probably find, as I did with Mitch, that if you think outside the box, it
won't take hours to get your problem solved. The tire-store incident took
less than one hour from start to finish, while letter writing and formal
complaints could have taken weeks.
2. THINK LIKE A BUSINESS
Remember this: Appeal to the company's bottom line by making
clear that it will cost more to ignore you than to give you what you
want.
To get your due from dishonorable businesses, you must think the same way
they do. Corporations don't care that you were delivered the wrong sofa and
it doesn't match your carpet—they care about the bottom line. Because
of this, your simple task is to convince them that it will be more costly to
ignore you than to give you what you deserve. How do you do that? Skip the sob
story and cut to the deal.
Let's take a look at what happened with Mitch at the tire store. I
didn't complain in typical "customer" fashion, explaining how I
felt betrayed or that I'd really been looking forward to my new tires.
Mitch was prepared for that—armed with his "It's our
policy" line. Instead, I caught him off-guard with a simple business
proposition. He could exchange the tires on my car, which would cost him
nothing but labor, or he could lose several times the value of the tires in
business when I persuaded other customers to go across the street. Rather than
pleading with him to treat me nicely or fairly, I gave him the opportunity to
make a "wise" business decision. Predictably, Mitch made the choice
that was best for his business's bottom line.
3. CHANNEL DIRTY HARRY
Remember this: If speaking up makes you nervous, write yourself a
script of what you will say to the unscrupulous business.
Picture Clint Eastwood trying to decide whether he'd fired off five
shots or six. Do you feel lucky? Do ya? That's the air you want to project
when dealing with business bad guys. Chances are, you're not actually going
to have to pass out your own $20 bills. But you are counting on your adversary
to look you in the eye, understand what's at stake, and believe you have
the capacity to get a little Dirty Harry.
This means you have to be willing to up the ante on traditional customer
complaints. This is not only more effective; it's also more cost-effective.
According to the FTC, the average consumer dispute is over an amount less than
$2,000. Factor in lawyer costs and time, and the conventional methods violate
the rule of making sure the effort's worth it for you. Plus, many
corporations have policies that all legal disputes must be handled in the
jurisdiction of the state in which the company was incorporated. Feel like
flying to Alaska to get back $30 for a busted CD player? Didn't think
so.
So I have several alternative suggestions. I call my Mitch strategy the Town
Crier technique. You, a concerned citizen, are willing to pass out flyers (or
money) just to make sure no one else has the negative experience you did.
Another effective Dirty Harry technique for small businesses: Spokesperson for
the Competition. You're so enraged by the lack of customer service that
you've written down your horror story and plan to give the business's
competitors and the local newspaper permission to publicize it. Be sure to fax
a neatly typed account of your mistreatment to the business at fault so
it'll know you're serious about following through if it doesn't
rectify its mistake.
Whatever plan of action you choose, the stuffed shirt on the other side of
the counter must believe that if he or she doesn't give you what you
deserve, it will Make Your Day.
4. DON'T FEAR GOLIATH
Remember this: If you're getting nowhere with customer
service, call Investor Relations or the Sales Department. Both are trained to
make happy customers, rather than just make them go away.
It's harder to pull a Dirty Harry with a big corporation than it is with
a local company. Losing a dozen customers doesn't hugely impact a business
that does thousands of transactions every day. You can get what you deserve
from a megacorp; it just takes a slightly different approach. Here's one
strategy.
My friend Tonya phoned me one afternoon. Her phone company (I'll call it
Universal Cellular, or UC) had been hassling her for months over a $200 billing
error. She gave me the details, and I said I'd look into it.
I logged on to the Internet, scanned the company's website, and found
the Investor Relations contact info and the stock symbol. Next, I clicked over
to my stockbroker's site and purchased ten shares of UC for 60 bucks. Now I
was a proud stockholder—an owner—of the company that was giving my
friend such a hard time.
I called the UC Investor Relations Department. A sparrow-voiced woman named
Felicia answered the phone.
I introduced myself, told her about Tonya, and concluded, "As a
stockholder, I'm concerned that we treat our customers fairly. I am
appalled by problems my friend has had with a simple billing dispute."
"I'm very sorry," she said. "I assure you, we value all
members of the UC family, whether stockholder or customer."
"I'm sure you do, Felicia," I said. "However, this has
upset me so much that I've decided to exercise my stockholder right to
attend the annual meeting, stand at the microphone, and let the chairman of the
board know—"
She cut me off.
"That won't be necessary," Felicia said nervously.
"I'm sure we can fix this. Is there a number where I can reach you in
a few minutes?" I hung up, knowing she'd get back to me with good
news.
Why was I so confident?
No one in the Investor Relations Department of a major corporation wants a
crazed minor stockholder making an appearance at the well-choreographed annual
meeting. If an analyst learned that UC's customers were less than happy, it
could negatively impact the stock price. I was counting on UC to make the wise
business decision—credit the $200 and avoid a scene.
My phone rang ten minutes later. It was Felicia. "Your friend's
been taken care of," she said. "Thank you for bringing this to our
attention."
I hung up the phone and returned to my brokerage account. UC was up 60 cents
on the day. I sold the ten shares. Tonya was straightened out, and I'd made
six bucks.
The moral of the story is that even with big business, you can get to the
top quickly. If no one responded to your fax to Customer Service, fax the CEO.
As unlikely as it sounds, bigwigs' personal fax numbers are often available
on the Web. Type in the executive officer's name, in quotes, and
"fax" in the search window. I once found the home-office number of a
Fortune 500 president this way. At the top of almost every corporation
there's a guy or gal who wants his or her customers treated fairly and is
appalled by the runaround they've been given by the peons in middle
management.
5. MAKE NICE WITH THE LITTLE GUY
Remember this: When on the phone, get every representative's
full name, agent number, and call-center location. Don't believe lines like
"I'm the only Mike here."
If you do find yourself stuck on the phone with one of those underpaid,
overworked middle managers, use that thankless job to your advantage. Make the
person feel as if he or she has the opportunity to be the hero of this tragedy
otherwise known as your consumer nightmare. Useful phrases include: "I
just know you're the person who can fix this" and "I would love
to write your manager to tell her how helpful you've been." Keep a
pencil next to your telephone, and be sure to jot down detailed notes from any
customer-service conversation. Make sure you get the service
representative's name, agent number, and any other personal information
that might later be of use. A few years ago an airline made a mistake with some
flight reservations to Hawaii that, if uncorrected, would have meant a lost
vacation for my entire family. The ticket agent adamantly tried to convince me
that the reservations had never been made. But because I was armed with the
service representative's name and ID number—and even knew the names
of her two daughters—the agent was forced to admit that I must indeed
have made the reservations. The vacation was fabulous.
6. GETTING WHAT YOU WANT
Remember this: If you shout or swear, the biz has an excuse to
label you a "problem customer" and not take you seriously.
Getting what you deserve does not involve yelling, threatening, or stomping
your feet. It also doesn't involve personal attacks or doing anything
illegal. (It never hurts to check with your attorney to confirm that your
planned actions are legal. Victory will be fleeting if your extraction of
justice is considered to be extortion of funds.) An irate, irrational customer
is easy to dismiss. As angry as you may feel, you stand a much better chance of
getting your way if you behave in a businesslike manner—calm, reasonable,
and simply stating the facts.
When dealing with a business, your goal is not to "get even" or
even to get a letter of apology. That's treating the experience like a tiff
with a friend, not thinking like a business. Your goal must be measurable in
dollars and cents. This can mean getting your money back, having the product
replaced, requiring a job to be redone—or any other remedy that can be
counted in ounces of gold rather than pounds of flesh. The hotel clerk may
offer a thousand apologies for your sleepless night next to the rehearsing Kiss
cover band. Until those apologies come with a complimentary night at the hotel,
your mission is not complete. Know exactly what you want, and be prepared to
repeat it clearly, succinctly, and ad nauseam. "I expect a full refund for
my hotel room" works much better than "Gosh, that was noisy. Boy, do
I wish there was something you could do.…"
One caution: if the fault is yours, meaning that you damaged the product or
ordered the wrong thing, don't try to shake down a company. It's not
good karma, and you could even find yourself on the wrong end of a lawsuit.
7. PROTECT YOURSELF
Remember this: Your credit card company can be your best friend.
Ask for a charge to be put "on hold" to give you additional leverage
when dealing with a problem company.
In a perfect world you'd never have to confront anyone about bad
service, because there would be no unscrupulous businesses. And there are a few
things you can do upfront to avoid the customer-service hassle altogether. You
are most powerful when the money is still in your pocket. Ask your friends
about their experiences with a corporation before you open your wallet. Check a
company's record with the Better Business
Bureau, and look for filings with the Federal
Trade Commission. Enter the company's name in an Internet search engine
and see what pops up.
There are also some government agencies that can help you get what you
deserve (see "Extra
Help"). Some will even enter the fight on your behalf. In many cases,
though, these organizations can't move quickly enough to help with
situations such as the tire-store incident, so always have a backup plan of
your own. If a company has not merely given bad service but has actually
committed a crime (fraud, theft), don't waste time negotiating. Call your
district attorney's office.
To be fair, most companies still give adequate customer service, and some
are absolutely fantastic. I've had terrific experiences with Costco,
Starbucks, and Circuit City, to name a few. But if we want all companies to
strive for the gold standard of customer service, we all need to learn to
settle for nothing less than what we deserve.
Ron Burley is a veteran consumer reporter and author of Unscrewed:
The Consumer's Guide to Getting What You Paid For (Ten Speed Press,
2006).
For black-and-white reprints of this article call 866-888-3723.
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