Swiss Cottage Cabs, Shari's Berries, and responsibility evasion

Duck responsibility, enrage a customer. As Seth Godin explains, it really is that simple. He publishes an email sent to a customer of Shari’s Berries, about a $65+ order for chocolate covered strawberries that they guaranteed would be delivered on Valentine’s Day:

Dear XXXXXXXXXXXXX,

We are writing to inform you that your order for delivery February 14th was not shipped yesterday as requested.

We are prepared to ship your order on February 14th for arrival on the 15th ..  Alternatively, you do have the option of canceling your order, but we’d
rather you did not.

We regret that your order did not ship as requested and in consideration of this delay, if you wish us to still ship the order, we will provide a discount of 40% off the normal product price.

Please choose which course of action you wish that we take by replying to this email or by sending an email to service@berries.com.

Sincerely,

Shari’s Berries Customer Service Team

If this seems to you like a reasonable way to serve a disappointed customer, listen to Seth.

[W]hat’s enraging about this note is that it’s not from a real person. That they don’t explain why or how they screwed up. That they didn’t learn anything. And that they don’t accept responsibility.

What if Shari herself had written? What if she had explained what had happened, how it wouldn’t happen again, and what she had learned?

Well, what’s even more enraging is that there is no apology at all in that message. But the utter lack of humanity is similarly infuriating.

I’ve noticed this a lot, living in the land that customer service forgot: Great Britain. Just this week, I was waiting for a taxi to drive me home from work (it was late, I had some heavy bags of clothes to carry) and called to check on its progress when, five minutes after it was due, there was no sign of the car.

“We don’t have you on our list,” the dispatcher told me.

“Really? I just called half an hour ago, I talked to one of your colleagues. Can you please check with them?”

“Hold on...No, you’re not on the list. Where are you? I can send a car out soon.”

“I’m sure there must be a car on its way - I was assured that there was only thirty minutes ago.”

The dispatcher had a word with his colleagues, and two minutes later determined that the car was three minutes away. That fact was communicated, but there was no apology and no regret. My driver, however, was very apologetic and sweet. Still, if you think I’ll be using Swiss Cottage Cabs again, you’re wrong.

My usual favourite cab service is Cricklewood Cars. The other day, though, my late taxi from that firm was explained thusly:

“We have it down to pick you up at 20 till.”

“But I only called 40 minutes ago, and very specifically asked to be picked up at 20 past. Your operator even noted that it would only be a 40 minute wait.”

“Well, we have it down to pick you up at 20 till.”

“Well, that is wrong and I needed a cab five minutes ago.”

“I can send one now if you want.”

No apology, and not one lick of regret.

So while I support and am happy to highlight Seth Godin’s point about evading responsibility, my ulterior motives are a lot more selfish: I want people who type the names of these companies into their search engines to find this post and think twice about spending money with them. Any chance that your disgruntled customers might be inclined to do the same?

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