Mhall46184@aol.com
When High-Tech Goes All Manual Typewriter on You
Did you hear the one about the man who walked into a ‘phone store and was greeted immediately?
Really, it happened.
Within my aging MePhone there was an email failure somewhere along the Verizon / Apple / AOL continuum which I was unable to resolve by following the instructions on various InterGossip sites.
With a desperate prayer on my lips and after bidding farewell to friends and family (can you hear me now?), I closed out my business affairs, packed what I thought I would need for a long sojourn in the wilderness of hard plastic chairs, and bid farewell to the past.
I took my existential despair and distressed MePhone to the Verizon store in Jasper, Texas, and as I entered - a staffer immediately stood up, smiled, and offered to sooth the wounded ‘phone.
Hey, if I am false in this matter may I be subjected to the agony of an eternity of Marty Haugen hymns.
I’m not kidding. I walked into a ‘phone store. A staffer stood up, smiled, and greeted me. Immediately.
In a world where customer service is more and more a grudging grunt from an unraised head behind a computer, this was a moment of joy, not unlike the Pilgrim’s Chorus from Tannhauser.
The staffer then listened to me – as in LISTENED TO ME - worked mysterious wonders with my MePhone, consulted briefly with another staffer, solved my problem within mere minutes, and thanked me for visiting Verizon.
Really. This happened.
Upon returning home I determined to send an email to Verizon praising the customer service at their Jasper store.
I accessed Verizon’s official webfootsite and soon realized that I was K in Kafka’s Das Schloss – access would be forever denied. Verizon told me that my access code, the one I have used for years and which the young staffer employed successfully only hours before, was not really my code. Not only would I have to give Verizon the right code, which would not be the right code, I would have to join a club or something.
Verizon does provide a physical address so that a grateful customer can send them a letter. A letter, with a stamp. Typed on a sheet of paper. So high-tech, eh?
Apparently the one thing impossible with Verizon is sending them an ordinary email complimenting the excellent customer service at one of their stores.
But then, perhaps the concept of good customer service is alien to corporate structures.
Anyway, thanks to the nice folks at the Jasper store for coaxing my MePhone into lighting up and making noises again.
-30-
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