Sandlines

I’ve long thought of  First Capital Connect’s ‘thamselink’ service as the train line that time forgot. So I was quite surprised earlier this year when they launched a potentially great Twitter service, promising that, if you tell them where you travel to and from, they will direct tweet service announcements that affect your journey.

The direct tweets generate and email and a text message to give me more-or-less instant notification of problems, so I can plan around them. This is a great customer service/marketing promise… I signed up.

I’ve since had all kinds of updates about stuff happening at opposite ends of their service, on trains that have no connection with my own little branch line. Oh well, you come to expect disappointment from train services I guess. Not the end of the world, just somewhat spammy.

This week, I’ve tried to use their trains on four separate occasions, only to discover that, for reasons that have gone unexplained (unexpected autumn leaf falls?), they have been unable to offer trains. Or, it seems, notifications on their twitter feed.

I’d never seek to discourage organisations from trying new things to improve their customer service or perception – and I strongly believe that the types of service messages First Capital Connect promised show enormous promise.

But if you make a promise, you have to keep it.

My frustration at the cancelled trains is severely compounded by the failure of the train company to keep their notification promise. I’d not have like the cancellation anyway, but would have been impressed with their ability to advise me ahead of time and therfore allow me to make other plans.

In the language of tweets, #fail

*===* UPDATE *===*

(no) more trains?

(12th November, noon) – I’ve found out why First Capital Connect are in such a bad way: they’re suffering from industrial action. They’ve even devised a new timetable. They just haven’t bothered to tell any of their twitter followers (to my knowledge) about this. Genius.

Oh – and it turns out compensation can be claimed at their website. Maybe that’s why they’re not telling anyone?

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… but it seems that (some ways of using) Twitter might not be free for much longer..

Amid rumours that Twitter and Amazon are in talks about a potential acquisition, it seems that Twitter are considering how to charge people to use their services.

But surely there is some mistake in this piece over on Brand Republic, who quote SalesForce.com’s charging structure at $995 per month?

Maybe not: the idea is quite an interesting one. You are basically asking Twitter to scour tweets for customer comments about your company – allowing you to then respond directly (and publicly) to people who are complaining, complementing or looking for info about your business.

This reminds me a lot of the things that Jeff Jarvis talks about in his excellent book “What Would Google Do?”. He describes the fall-out from his ‘Dell Sucks’ post(s) a few years back – and the whole question around whether companies should be monitoring the buzz around their brands from blogs. (answer: yes). And lambasting the response that said: “We look but we don’t touch” given by Dell when they were asked about their approach to consumer comments on blogs.

In other words, I (for one) thoroughly welcome this idea. Who knows, maybe customer service will improve generally if companies start listening to their customers?

(I know, radical thought, isn’t it?)

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Bye Bye Voda?

Maybe I’m just becoming (an even grumpier) grumpy old man, but one of the things I’ve noticed as we’ve talked ourselves into recession is a steep decline in customer service.

Why is this? Some thoughts:

• as companies are becoming stressed about their future, they are giving less thought to ensuring their customers feel valued
• as staff feel their jobs are less secure, their discontent shows in the way they handle all types of customer interaction
• as I spend my money as a customer, I feel companies (and their staff) should be more grateful that I’m still spending

I don’t have any hard data to back this up, but I can relate something anecdotally.

Vodafone, my mobile service provider, have been a company I’ve unhesitatingly recommended to friends and family. I know of a few people who’ve switched to them on the basis of my enthusiastic endorsement of their customer service.

As well as my mobile phone account (with very healthy ARPU) I also bought a mobile broadband connection – which I’ve subsequently passed on to a colleague who is using it (and paying for it) in my place. We couldn’t do this formally as he is an ex-pat american, and has no credit history here. So far so good.

Except that last week Vodafone suspended my mobile phone. Why? Because the payment for the mobile broadband was overdue… by TWO DAYS. No warning, just frustration as a result of a very modest oversight.

I suspect their reaction would have been more in proportion had this happened a few months ago. But, with my contract just two months from renewal date, I feel the other networks beckoning.

I’ve seen this type of corporate response in various ways over the past few weeks (though not as dramatic) from larger companies.

Interestingly, the smaller businesses I deal with (personally and professionally) seem to be a very different story – and I believe this is an opportunity smaller businesses can seize – to show customers what great service really is, and win market share on the back of it.

Here’s hoping.

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