Last month was pretty quiet on the Order Prevention Department front. Possibly this is because I have been working hard selling my own services, rather than trying to buy things at the moment. Or, perhaps this is just another symptom of the much advertised "credit crunch".
Still, I did find one company to annoy me; Ford Finance. Now, I don't want to be too hard on Ford Finance (gasps of breath are heard at the back) as they are not alone in being guilty of offering a specific type of bad service that many of us have endured. I am of course referring to the "Automated Telephone System". You know the "Press 1 for Sales, Press 2 for Accounts..." sort of thing.
Well, I am prepared to endure these systems as long as I get to speak to the right person in a reasonable amount of time. Is that too much to ask? Sage Software are also guilty of Order Prevention as their phone system has so many menu options and sub menus, that it can easily take a couple of minutes of button pressing before you get to hear the classic "Your call is important to us. You are currently in a queue and your call will be answered in approximately 8-10 minutes. Come on, if my call is that important to you, have more people available to pick up the phone! But I digress... this blog is about Ford Finance.
I needed to check a settlement statement on a policy that I had. So I called Ford Finance and got their Automated Order Prevention Department. The system asked my for my policy number - which I entered. It then asked me for my customer number - which I also entered. It then asked me to wait - which I did. Eventually the phone was picked up by a human being and I was asked for my policy number. I said that I had already entered this. There was a slight pause and then I was asked for my customer number. I said that I has already entered this information as well and why was I being asked twice? The poor chap on the other end of the phone was either new, or untrained, but had no idea that the phone system had already asked me for this information. In the end I had to repeat all my details again.
So, with such a poor automated phone system, coupled with poor staff and / or training - why on earth would I want to buy from them again?
Fight back I say - never do business with an organisation that has an Automated Order Prevention Department. You have been warned.
