Aug 8, 2007

Armstrong un-goofs!

Hey! The story from yesterday continues! Look at the email that I discovered after lunch today:

I would like to personally respond to your comments posted yesterday relative to your being on hold for four hours with Armstrong. My name is Charles Wrightson and I am responsible for Customer Service in our Floor Products Operation. This is totally unacceptable customer service and we sincerely apologize for your extended inconvenience. Our caller experience is extremely important to us and we take the process very seriously.

We do track metrics specific to phone calls with all departments. Our records indicate the longest hold time for yesterday in any department for Flooring Products was 9 minutes 28 seconds. Our corporate communications team also ran a query for all 23 incoming queues for the entire Company and the longest hold time was 17 minutes ( which is used for internal vendors and retirees ). So your experience leads us to believe that we may have a problem with our systems. Would you please do us a favor and tell us which phone number you used to contact us and most importantly we want to help you with your question regarding the floor in your church.

From your message , it is difficult to determine how we can best reach you, other than by e mail. My phone number is xxx-xxx-xxxx. I will be travelling the rest of this week, so please leave a message if I don`t answer , or you can reach Kathy Mallinson at xxx-xxx-xxxx.

Again, we apologize and are extremely embarrassed by your experience. I can assure you it is not how we want to be perceived, nor how we normally conduct business. Thanks for giving us the opportunity to recover from our goof.

Nice! Here's how I replied:

Now *this* is encouraging! Not only because it looks like I'll get some information but because Armstrong is hip enough to watch even little-read blogs (and fewer blogs are littler-read than this one!). I assume you watch the net for mention of your company with Google alerts or other means. Way to stay current, AWI! I'll post this on the blog in a way that will give you heaps of credit but protect your privacy.

I was calling from xxx-xxx-xxxx. Please let me know what your log shows for that number, if anything. I'll try calling you now. Thanks.

And a little later, I added:

Satisfaction at last! I tried your phone, got your voice mail, called Kathy, and she transferred me to Jennie Kapwell, who gave me solid answers! I'm once again strong on Armstrong! As mentioned in my previous email, I called from xxx-xxx-xxxx and hope to hear back as to whether that number shows up in your system. And I'll give you kudos on YaGoof.com tonight! Thanks.

I really have to hand it to Armstrong. I'm not completely surprised, though. I attended a work seminar some years ago where there was a very interesting speaker who spoke about how seriously Armstrong takes customer service. As I recall, the speaker said that Armstrong had a product that customers regularly damaged by using the wrong type of cleaner, apparently because they weren't reading the directions, and the result was many unhappy customers. Armstrong turned the situation around by beginning to print their support number right on the product, which made customers have to call up to ask how to get the !@#$ printing off--which created the opportunity to tell the customers the correct type of cleaner to use! Satisfaction soared! Brilliant! The speaker's point was that complainers (like moi) can become among the most loyal of customers if you treat them right.

There's no doubt that the next time I need to think about flooring, the first brand that I'll consider will be Armstrong. Armstrong World Industries is our first official Un-Goof.

Charles Wrightson, thanks so much for your email! I do hope to hear back about whether my phone number shows up in your system--and maybe you can verify or correct the details of the "how do you remove the printing story."

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