The Moby Files: v2.0

I guess customer service isn’t dead. Its no secret I tend to whine a lot about lip service most big corps give about customer service.

I sent the Apple guy flowers yesterday. Besides the obvious, he got some very sad news and I wanted to put a smile on his face. It might be old-fashioned but I think sending flowers is a very sweet and meaningful gesture.¹ Anyway, I had never used 1800flowers.com before, they were top of the search list for online ordering so I decided to give’em a whirl.

My choice was a small medley of simple but pretty flowers along with a small teddy bear and chocolates; totally the right choice in my mind. They arrived no problem and he seemed to enjoy them.

However, he happened to post a pic online and I was irritated to all hell. Not only was it NOT what I sent, the flowers were already wilting and droopy. No no no, no ma’am, no siree bob, uh-uh, no-no . . .  I fired off a short but direct and honest email to the company.² Being in a customer service oriented industry, I did try to balance my disappointment with constructive feedback. Just being nasty and making threats rarely works. I don’t think it is unreasonable to have an expectation of services promised and feel it is important for consumers to hold companies accountable for shitty service.

To my surprise, they sent him a 2nd round of flowers totally free of charge before they responded to my complaint. I actually had no idea until he texted me at work about the 2nd delivery. I logged into my email³ and sure enough there was an email apology, the notice of the 2nd delivery, and a $20 gift certificate!  Sure enough, the 2nd pic posted was much more in line with what I had originally ordered. Not only that, they were fresh!

You could have sold me for a quarter and got change back I was so surprised! A corporate entity actually went out of its way to make their customer happy! What a ducky idea! lol Seriously though, I was very pleased, as was the Apple guy to get 2 deliveries of flowers! And yes, I will give them another try in the future.

1. As my luck would have it, so did he. [↩]
2. I honestly didn’t expect them to do anything but I wanted them to know how displeased I was. [↩]
3. I don’t load my junk email account on my PDA [↩]