Using the Internet to raise complaints

[Jeepdude]

@RiverRat you are in the pefect position to make the call yourself with your own past experience and actions as customer and also management. you had vented your frustration towards the bike wash dudes at sabie on a public forum which in turn was greeted with a response i think was neither good from consumer or provider point of view.

as a small retail business owner i would also like to be made aware of short comings.. but it makes it embarrasing when somebody rants in public about their experience. often things are said out of frustration and out of context which can be far more damaging than just loosing one customer...

 

if your business is small enough to reply (in a patient and tactfull manner) to individual enquiries then go for it. but if it is not going to respond in time or at all... why go through the process?

 

a business like Powasol which is one man owned stand to loose a WHOLE lot more from a skewed perception and lack of patience and resulting slandering than a big corporate

Edited December 23, 2011 by jeepdude

[River Rat]

@Jeepdude believe me Klint had more than enough oportunity at Sabie not only with myself but with many of his other customers to address the issue. On day two he promised us that things would improve dramatically on which he did not deliver. After that he simply shrugged his shoulders and dismiised our complaints. It might surprise you to note that at one point on the Bike Wash thread I was actually satisfied that he acknowledged his short comings and was going to address it. He blew it somewhat after that but my guess is that he will either learn from this or he won't survive. Many of those big corporates have survived because they confronted that undenialable truth that your service is as good as your customer perception of it. The strange thing is that Powasol not only have a great product but also delivered a great bike wash service to me in the past, I not sure what the hell went wrong at Sabie. But that is the harsh reality of business you're only as good as your last job.

[Jeepdude]

@Jeepdude believe me Klint had more than enough oportunity at Sabie not only with myself but with many of his other customers to address the issue. On day two he promised us that things would improve dramatically on which he did not deliver. After that he simply shrugged his shoulders and dismiised our complaints. It might surprise you to note that at one point on the Bike Wash thread I was actually satisfied that he acknowledged his short comings and was going to address it. He blew it somewhat after that but my guess is that he will either learn from this or he won't survive. Many of those big corporates have survived because they confronted that undenialable truth that your service is as good as your customer perception of it. The strange thing is that Powasol not only have a great product but also delivered a great bike wash service to me in the past, I not sure what the hell went wrong at Sabie. But that is the harsh reality of business you're only as good as your last job.

Time will tell... hope you find your answers though..

[Noneking]

I've made use of the Rant 'n Rave forum on The Hub on two occasions. In both instances it was AFTER I had e-mailed, called, faxed and e-mailed again without any response and/or acceptable solution to my problem or complaint.

 

I started my Rants on The Hub only after I felt like I was being ignored by the service provider. In both cases, I got immediate response from service provider in question, apologizing for their poor service and rectifying the mistakes made within hours.

[TNT1]

Using the Internet to raise complaints Is this a legitimate vehicle or not?

 

Sorry, I didn't understand much of the original post, so I supplanted the original question.

 

Yes. Using the internet is a legitimate vehicle for complaints.

[GrumpyOldGuy]

Sorry, I didn't understand much of the original post, so I supplanted the original question.

 

Yes. Using the internet is a legitimate vehicle for complaints.

 

Yeah, agree, I think its perfectly fine and even necessary in some cases.

[King_Crispy]

Yeah, agree, I think its perfectly fine and even necessary in some cases.

 

 

+1

My OP about Holla Trails was not intended to damage the establishment in any way, but merely to get the markings rectified so that others would not have the same experience I did.

I was promised a response by the manager, but when none was forthcoming, I took to the interwebs for resolution.

It worked, and many other cyclists after me have had a good time. Sometimes it takes a good prod to get the horse going...

[ROCKITRIDEIT]

very recently i had a gripe with Groupon, who had debited my bank account and not provided me with the coupon to claim my deal which, as it turns out, did not have sufficient uptake.

 

3 unanswered emails to their customer support email address led me to post a negative report on Hello Peter. 2 hours later I received a phonecall from Groupon's Hello Peter dedicated monitor profusely apologising for the poor service and promising to process the refund same day, which they did.

 

So I think it i perfectly fine to post a complaint on a public internet forum only AFTER you have contacted the other party directly and given them the chance to rectify the problem first.

 

But my experience left me puzzled why Groupons management didn't invest more heavily in their email customer support team, so as to avoid the inevitable brand damage.