Seth is giving a free lesson on the basics of how to treat your customers and have them involved in your working process. And that reminds me that today I spent more that 30 minutes on hold with the customer service from Astral (which is one of the largest internet provider from Romania). And after more than half hour of waiting I hang up. I was lucky that I had the phone on the speaker and had some work done in the meantime, but that doesn't mean Astral really sucks when it comes to the way they treat their customers. If there's anybody working for Astral reading this then go read and try to understand what Seth is saying, it shouldn't be that hard to put into practice - I'd say it's common sense.

Incidentally today I also went to Astral's HQ for arranging for the internet connection for our new office and it was the same bad way of client service - you go in a booth where you don't know what to do and where theoretically speaking somebody is supposed to come help you. You have no idea about the time you're supposed to spend, who else is waiting, or what the order is. Heck, you don't even have any idea if anybody is supposed to come ask you what your deal is. Again lack of organizational skills that reflect on the way Astral is treating its customers - or the ones helping them creating value for the shareholders. Why - Seth says it again very well:

"How come Astral (my insertion) doesn't have a plan for dealing with this spike? We've all heard this excuse when we're on hold. Personally, it doesn't make me feel any better. I don't say, "Oh, they've staffed up with plenty of people but this particular moment is an exception so I'll cut them some slack." What's missing from the cost benefit analysis is pretty clear: a customer just took the initiative to call in, to do business with you, to pay attention. And the company, just to save a buck or so in excess capacity, makes this eager person just sit and wait."