Ten days ago I got a cold-call from TalkTalk. They called me on a number which is registered with the TPS and I have no existing business relationship with them so they should not have called that number.
In this situation most people, and this includes me, will probably just be mildly rude to the caller and hang up. But on this occasion I decided that I would take it further. I went to their web site to find a way to complain to them.
The don’t make it easy to find a way to get in touch via their web site, but eventually I found this form. The form starts by asking what your question is about. But the choice of subjects doesn’t include “Unwanted Cold Calls”. Eventually I decided to use “Joining TalkTalk” as it was the only option that seemed even vaguely appropriate. My problems didn’t end there as the form then changed to present me with a another list of options to choose from. Once more none of them matched so I chose “Before You Order” which was, at least, technically accurate.
Filling in the rest of the form was easy. I gave them my contact details, selected the option saying that I wasn’t a customer and wrote a description of my complain.
Lesson one: Making it hard to contact you will not stop people from contacting you. It will only ensure that that they are a little bit more angry with you when they eventually work out how to do it.
A couple of days later I got a reply by email. But it was useless. They said that they would remove my details from their marketing list (within 28 days!) but completely ignored my request for an explanation of why they thought it was reasonable to call me in the first place. So I replied to the email explaining in some detail why their response was unsatisfactory.
A few minutes later. I got an email telling me that my message could not be delivered as the email address was unknown. They had sent the email from an invalid email address. Presumably this is to stop people getting into a dialogue with them. Maybe it works for some people, but it didn’t work for me. I went straight back to the web form from hell and explained their shortcoming to them.
Lesson two: Never ever send customer complaint responses from an undeliverable email address. It gets your customers (and potential customers) really angry.
A couple of days later I got another reply. This one came from someone who at least seemed willing to try to deal with my problem. But they seemed somewhat confused. They said that they were unable to locate my file in their system and asked me to confirm whether or not I was a TalkTalk customer. Two problems with this. Firstly, they’re asking me to provide more details and not giving me an easy way to get the information back to them. And secondly, a few paragraphs back when I was talking about filling in the form for the first time I said that I “selected the option saying that I wasn’t a customer”. Yes, this information is included in the contact form. So why ask me for it.
Lesson three: If you ask someone for more information in order to progress a complaint, give them an easy way to get back to you. Otherwise they’ll just get even more angry.
Lesson four: If your contact form collects information, them make sure that information is available to the people dealing with the complaint. Asking people to repeat information that they have already given you is a great way to make them really angry.
I went back to the dreaded web form and filled it in again. Every reply I get has a case number assigned to it. Each new reply I submit generates a new case number. I’ve been copying the case numbers from the emails I’ve received and pasting them into the new request in the hope that someone will tie all of the replies together into a single thread.
Lesson five: Make it easy for your customer (or potential customer) to track the progress of their single ticket through your system. Forcing people to open multiple tickets for the same issue will just confuse your support staff and anger your customers.
Five simple lessons. All based around the idea that you really don’t want to make customers (or potential customers) angry. Let’s review the list.
Lesson one: Making it hard to contact you will not stop people from contacting you.
Lesson two: Never ever send customer complaint responses from an undeliverable email address.
Lesson three: If you ask someone for more information in order to progress a complaint, give them an easy way to get back to you.
Lesson four: If your contact form collects information, them make sure that information is available to the people dealing with the complaint.
Lesson five: Make it easy for your customer (or potential customer) to track the progress of their single ticket through your system.
Throughout this piece I’ve portrayed myself as a potential customer. I’m not, of course. The way the company have dealt with this complain has ensured that I’m never going to do business with TalkTalk.
But I’ll continue pushing this until they answer my questions. I’ll let you know how I get on.