Hold on just a second

Ok...so up front warning...this won't be my most relevant or interesting blog post - but I needed to vent.

My wife and I recently sat down and started going over some personal expenses. Truth be told, I don’t pay the bills at home, my wife takes care of the banking (math isn’t my favorite subject). What spawned this exercise was that our contract with our current satellite supplier is about to expire, and so I wanted to shop around and see if there was a better way to go this time.

Vendor A is my current supplier – the only service I currently have with them is satellite.

Vendor B offers the same service, and is my current supplier for telephone / long distance and internet access.

I wanted to go with 1 supplier for all three services, so the shopping process began.

The market is extremely competitive. Both companies offer the same trio of services, and they are all priced relatively the same. So, how do I choose whether or not to switch two services over to Vendor A, or one service over to Vendor B? I decided that I would call both vendors, and see what each were willing to do for my exclusive account. I know that the strategy for both these companies is to ultimately provide all services to each of their clients. Like a bank, it becomes about share of wallet.

I started with Vendor A:
First, as I always do, I got online to see what info was available. The site was terrible in that not only could I not find the information I needed, but subsequently had a terrible time trying to get a phone number to call customer service. When I finally found a number – I waited 44 minutes on hold, and eventually hung up (but was reminded every 4 minutes on hold how important my call was). So I decided to send them an email. I received a reply within seconds. It was an automated response re-directing me to call the 800 number. No thank you!

I then moved on to Vendor B:
I got online, I found pricing for bundling all three services, and then I called them. The phone number for customer service was prevalent all over the site. I waited under a minute on hold (46 seconds). Very impressive.

Vendor A never stood a chance. They never even got to try and keep my business. For me, it was a no brainer. In the end, I pay a tiny bit more to move all services over to Vendor B, but I was so turned off by the difference in customer service, it became a decision of principle.

When customer service is all that separates you from your competitors, you better make sure you get it right.