On Sat, 6 Mar 2004 18:49:45 -0000, "John Stumbles"
wrote:


* with the best will in the world I'm sure we all have them - sometimes for

Don't get me wrong - I can understand that things can and do go wrong
in any company and I have a very forgiving attitude about such things.
And when my order didn't turn up on the prescribed day I was pretty
laid back about it - I didn't shout or jump up and down thumping the
desk, I just spoke quietly to the lady at the other end and arranged
the re-schedule for the following day. An inconvenience for me but job
done.

But I felt a duty to write to the Screwfix MD to advise him of my
dis-satisfaction at the service his organisation had offered - on the
basis that I wanted Screwfix to improve their services and reduce
their outlay on dealing with problem orders - that would help everyone
because then they could keep their prices down. Again I was quite laid
back about the letter I sent. I expected a reasonable response along
the lines of "we are so sorry we messed this up - we will try harder".
This isn't difficult to do, neither is it costly in terms of customer
satisfaction.

Instead I get no response whatsoever. When the order did arrive it was
wholly misconfigured. It took about a week to get my £9 fast delivery
refunded. And now a couple of weeks after my displeasure has died down
and gone away I get a threatening letter. I had moved on from feeling
bad about Screwfix - and they decided to relight the fuse.

Why was this threatening letter so necessary? I can understand them
having a problem with someone doing what I did in terms of getting the
domain name, no problem there. But they could have approached it a bit
more diplomatically IMHO, and I'd have been very happy to transfer the
domain to them on their request - I would have been doing them a
favour by taking a domain name out of circulation that could
potentially be used to damage their reputation. But now, sod them -
even if they can get nominet to listen to their whingeing and effect a
transfer they can have the maximum amount of inconvenience I can make
available.

The threatening letter would have probably been appropriate if I had
published something on that domain which they had an issue with. Then
I would expect their legal team to be threatening me if I didn't
remove it, and I would probably deserve the consequences.

I might add that had Screwfix dealt with this situation
sympathetically instead of aggressively I would almost certainly have
been singing their praises here and elsewhere about what a great
company they are to deal with despite their occasional shortcomings.
It does seem so silly that they cannot grasp the simple concept that
customers are worth looking after.

PoP

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