Can anyone tell me what happened to human beings in customer service?
I READ Allan C Steele’s letter (November 29) with considerable sympathy, but at least he had the opportunity to speak to human beings. In the following account of my current experience, the only human contact was in the initial phone call.
The problem began, 10 days ago, with my local Mcdonald’s outlet making an error – no crispy chicken in the Crispy Chicken order. Although I had initiated the process with the Mcdonald’s home delivery service, Mcdelivery, I found myself being passed over to another company, Uber Eats, to take the order. In due course, Uber Eats completed the delivery faultlessly.
When I phoned the Mcdonald’s outlet, I was astonished at the response: I would have to take it up with Uber Eats. I pointed out that, as far as I was concerned my transaction was with Mcdonald’s; Mcdonald’s made the error, so Mcdonald’s should fix it; I shouldn’t have to deal with one of its contractors, particularly since the contractor’s service had been excellent. I was told again to contact Uber Eats.
I pursued the matter online with Mcdelivery and, separately, with Mcdonald’s, and got the same responses – which I consider outrageous, particularly when their emails are padded out with platitudes about how much my “custom is appreciated” and “our aim is 100% customer satisfaction”.
Since then, I have tried to pursue the issue with Uber Eats and it has turned out to be a complete farce. I have received
the same “automatic” email from it seven times so far (by now it has become a matter of principle, rather than recompense). On each occasion I have replied with details of the problem. In the latter instances, I have pointed out that I have already responded.
I then tried to phone them. After a considerable time searching I found a number. Each time I dialled, the phone didn’t even ring – a message appeared saying “call forwarded”, with no indication of where/to whom it had been forwarded.
Having been a subscriber to Which? magazine for around 50 years I thought I’d give it a try, for the first time; not to intervene in my particular trivial case, but to address the wider issue of Mcdonald’s deflecting its customers to deal with its
contractors. I soon received an automatic response, which advised that “due to the volume of feedback we receive, you probably won’t get an individual reply from us”.
Surely it is time for all customer service websites to be made to warn users “Abandon Hope All Who Enter Here”. Charles Mcmillan,
Milngavie.