My phone stopped sending texts last week, giving a fairly terse error. My phone is a Palm Centro, so it’s unusual. The first place I turn for help with it are always forums on the interweb. That’s what I did. The error code it gives, it turns out, is a carrier/network error. That signalled bad news to me: I was going to have to phone T-Mobile and ask for their help. I knew that this would be a nightmare: I’d have to wait a long time, they would want to ask me lots of questions about the error and the phone but they wouldn’t know anything about the Palm Centro since they don’t sell it (I bought it sim free for use on any network).

Lo, I had to wait about half an hour, the chap started asking me all about my Nokia N61 (an awful phone I’d ditched within about 2 days of getting it from them) and didn’t know anything about the Palm. He wasn’t interested in the fact that I’d done the research on the error which had concluded it was a network problem. He said that the network where I was was working fine and suggested that since the phone wasn’t one they sold or supported, I’d have to find another phone to test my sim in and/or try another sim in my phone. I’d have to do all the work in other words.

Well, fair enough I guess. I haven’t done anything more yet (apart from continue to have to phone people who send me texts to explain that I can’t reply). But then, the kicker. Today, T-Mobile sent me a text. It was a survey asking me how I rated the help I got from the support call. A text, yes. I had to reply…by text.  So whilst I desperately wanted to reply “1. Not at all” I couldn’t of course. Brilliant. Clearly it’s an automated system which would happen for every support call. But then, wouldn’t a lot of support calls tend to be about problems with texts or the phone generally? Wouldn’t it make sense for the customer service dude to be able to set a flag to say: “Don’t send this person a text to survey their satisfaction with my call – it won’t work”?

For me, T-Mobile have added insult to injury. They’ve failed to help me and then rubbed my face in it. My contract is long over. Maybe the quickest way to sort my problem would be just to jump ship…

So how about the idea of bringing new employees in, giving them a four week training course to immerse them in the customer focussed culture but after a week, offer them a pile of cash to leave. That’s what online shoe shop zappos.com does. The idea is that it sorts the call centre customer friendly wheat from the money grabbing chaff (or something).

The full piece is here at Harvard Business Publishing and is definitely worth a read.

Via kottke.org.