Dear Orange Mobile Customer Support
Apr. 17th, 2013 01:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackDear Orange Mobile Customer Support
Dear Orange Mobile Customer Support,
This may surprise you to know, but most MOBILE PHONE customers call your MOBILE PHONE customer service support line from their MOBILE PHONES. This means:
1. Thy can't easily listen and press buttons on the keypad at the same time.
2. It's unnecessarily difficult to memorise which letters used to be on which keypad buttons in the last millennium. I can just about do it because I've used it enough, and remember that "1" was used for something else, and "abc" starts on "2". Is there a good reason we can't use our KEYBOARDS for entering letters?
Also:
1. The convoluted "press the number corresponding to the numeric value of 3rd character of your password divided by three and a half plus one" system is rather undermined when the phone rep helpfully responds to "I can't remember which password I used" with "is it the <something> one?" I don't think you understand how passwords work. (Hypocritically, I might rather have the convenience over the security, but it's still a bad idea to pretend you're more secure than you are.)
2. I first got an orange phone about ten years ago. The breakdown of which systems (phone, web, pin, etc) use completely separate passwords has changed in that time. Try something helpful like "this is the same password you use on the website" or "this is not the same password you use on the website, you would have had to set it up when you set up the account" would be more helpful than "I don't know".
3. I'm aware you perpetrate an internal zargon, but are you seriously unaware that people who are not mobile phone providers may not see "disconnect from the network" and "disconnect from the network with a PAC code" as two disparate options? If someone says they want to disconnect from your network, which is more likely?
A. They are one of the 99% of people who are cancelling because they're moving to a different network and ALWAYS want to keep their mobile phone number and used "disconnected" in the normal English meaning, not the mobile phone operator specific meaning, or,
B. They are one of the 1% of people who has decided mobile phones are for mugs, or who wants to vanish unreachably from their friends, and divined that "disconnect" means "disconnect without a PAC code"?
I think A is more likely. Even if you consider it imperative that you force them to repeat their request using your terminology, a better way to do that would be to ask them to, not deliberately misunderstand them and force them to start over.
4. I'm going to stop giving you money. I'd prefer you to stop giving me mobile phone service. I can't believe you don't have a procedure for this. But no. I have to pay for the following month come what may. And I can be issued with a PAC code which only operates UNTIL the end of the month. And if I fail to apply that in 26 days time, Orange are entitled to RENEW billing me. How the hell is that legal? And to me that sounds like "I have to pay for two days of overlap". But no, the rep thought that was completely wrong, but I couldn't understand how what he said was different.
I'm sure there's a good reason it works that way, but I was still very frustrated.
Love Jack
Postamble
Oh dear. If I can find that much wrong in a five minute conversation with (apparently) a successful outcome, how can I cope with the rest of life? I think the problem is that I instinctively EXPECT things to make sense, and if they don't, either hate myself for misunderstanding, or hate the person I'm talking to for being difficult. Which I KNOW shouldn't be the case -- I KNOW that a lot of the time, "just get it sorted" is the only option, and it's only worth so much effort. But knowing it doesn't convince my emotions to actually believe it :(
Dear Orange Mobile Customer Support,
This may surprise you to know, but most MOBILE PHONE customers call your MOBILE PHONE customer service support line from their MOBILE PHONES. This means:
1. Thy can't easily listen and press buttons on the keypad at the same time.
2. It's unnecessarily difficult to memorise which letters used to be on which keypad buttons in the last millennium. I can just about do it because I've used it enough, and remember that "1" was used for something else, and "abc" starts on "2". Is there a good reason we can't use our KEYBOARDS for entering letters?
Also:
1. The convoluted "press the number corresponding to the numeric value of 3rd character of your password divided by three and a half plus one" system is rather undermined when the phone rep helpfully responds to "I can't remember which password I used" with "is it the <something> one?" I don't think you understand how passwords work. (Hypocritically, I might rather have the convenience over the security, but it's still a bad idea to pretend you're more secure than you are.)
2. I first got an orange phone about ten years ago. The breakdown of which systems (phone, web, pin, etc) use completely separate passwords has changed in that time. Try something helpful like "this is the same password you use on the website" or "this is not the same password you use on the website, you would have had to set it up when you set up the account" would be more helpful than "I don't know".
3. I'm aware you perpetrate an internal zargon, but are you seriously unaware that people who are not mobile phone providers may not see "disconnect from the network" and "disconnect from the network with a PAC code" as two disparate options? If someone says they want to disconnect from your network, which is more likely?
A. They are one of the 99% of people who are cancelling because they're moving to a different network and ALWAYS want to keep their mobile phone number and used "disconnected" in the normal English meaning, not the mobile phone operator specific meaning, or,
B. They are one of the 1% of people who has decided mobile phones are for mugs, or who wants to vanish unreachably from their friends, and divined that "disconnect" means "disconnect without a PAC code"?
I think A is more likely. Even if you consider it imperative that you force them to repeat their request using your terminology, a better way to do that would be to ask them to, not deliberately misunderstand them and force them to start over.
4. I'm going to stop giving you money. I'd prefer you to stop giving me mobile phone service. I can't believe you don't have a procedure for this. But no. I have to pay for the following month come what may. And I can be issued with a PAC code which only operates UNTIL the end of the month. And if I fail to apply that in 26 days time, Orange are entitled to RENEW billing me. How the hell is that legal? And to me that sounds like "I have to pay for two days of overlap". But no, the rep thought that was completely wrong, but I couldn't understand how what he said was different.
I'm sure there's a good reason it works that way, but I was still very frustrated.
Love Jack
Postamble
Oh dear. If I can find that much wrong in a five minute conversation with (apparently) a successful outcome, how can I cope with the rest of life? I think the problem is that I instinctively EXPECT things to make sense, and if they don't, either hate myself for misunderstanding, or hate the person I'm talking to for being difficult. Which I KNOW shouldn't be the case -- I KNOW that a lot of the time, "just get it sorted" is the only option, and it's only worth so much effort. But knowing it doesn't convince my emotions to actually believe it :(
no subject
Date: 2013-04-18 09:44 am (UTC)