A situation of concern involving an online order that had persisted for more than a month finally resolved itself this week, when I managed to reach an actual person at the other end of my email inquiries.
I”d placed the order at the end of October and by the end of November I was trying to determine when the item would ship.
It took three attempts, to three different email addresses, for someone to finally reply. My first attempt was to reply to the address that sent the order confirmation. When no one replied, I went to the website to look up another email address.
Upon my first visit, I selected a link called “Send Customer Feedback” and sent a message to the address specified. This, too, received no reply.
On my third visit, I selected “Contact Us,” which displayed yet another address.
Each subsequent message was worded by me with increasing frustration at being ignored. Only the third and final message ever received a reply.
To his credit, the person replied right away; he apologized for my trouble and offered a detailed explanation of when my order would ship.
In fairness to him, he was right in saying this was the first message he”d received. He suggested in future, for better results, I should use the “appropriate” address.
I will concede that as someone who places value upon information literacy, locating the “appropriate” method of contact is generally good advice – except that in this situation, it was easier said than done.
I suppressed the desire to respond sarcastically, i.e. “Great advice, buddy!” and instead thanked the person for the information he”d provided.
I speculated about the situation from the other person”s point of view: he”d received the force of my anger over emails that went unanswered, of which none had been to him.
Could I have handled the situation more diplomatically, given that I”m the only person whose behavior I have the power to change? Maybe. Possibly.
But I do think a lesson for business in this exchange is to make sure that appropriate methods of contact are clearly and consistently explained. If a business offers more than one email address for its customers” correspondence, then any and all of those addresses become the “appropriate” ones to use.
Cynthia Parkhill is focus publications editor for the Record-Bee. Contact her at rbinfocus@gmail.com or call her at 263-5636 ext. 39.
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