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Similarly, I think that completely automated and computerized telephone-based "customer service" systems are only ever so slightly less utterly useless. No matter how perky and frou-frou'd up they may be designed to sound.
Here's my deal: I ordered some headphones from Amazon. I got a notice on the door yesterday from UPS saying that they tried to deliver it. However, unlike all of the other such notices I have received in the past for things I've ordered from Amazon, on which I was able to simply sign my signature and then reattach it to the door for the next attempted delivery so that they'd just leave it at the door, this one, for some reason, was marked to indicate that I must sign IN PERSON. And they'd written a big VOID through the place where I'd have signed my name.
So, I sent an email to Amazon's customer service about it yesterday. And got an almost entirely irrelevant form letter this morning as a response.
Well, today, I got another UPS delivery notice, with the same VOID through the signature thing. Tomorrow would have been the final delivery. Simply put, because I can't miss work and stay home just to sign for a pair of headphones, I would have yet again not been here to sign for it. So, I tried to call the number indicated on the UPS slip, in an attempt to try to work something out (maybe a Saturday delivery or something). And I was confronted with an entirely unhelpful and horribly, teeth-gnashingly saccarine computerized voice. It asked me for my tracking number and then politely told me that they'd try to deliver it again tomorrow and then hold it for five days until I could come to them and pick it up, then they'd send it back. I knew this already. Computerized girl asked me if I cared to hear that again, which I did not. Then she gave the option of scheduling a future delivery date, among other options. So I tried that. Then she informed me in a far too bubbly manner that I could choose a day EXCEPT WEEKENDS and holidays, so what day did I want to pick? I had no answer for this, so I hung up and, after several minutes of pointless fuming, I tried again. This time, when faced with the options, I said "Return to sender". Okay, what is your reason for wanting to return to sender, *giggle*. (Obviously, she didn't really giggle, but it wouldn't have surprised me if she had. That's how annoying it was.) My reason ended up being "Other" since "BECAUSE YOU WON'T FUCKING LET ME JUST SIGN THE DAMNED SLIP AND HAVE YOU LEAVE THE THING AT THE DOOR" wasn't one of the options. At this point, she asked me if I had any other business, and I said "No" just as she apparently started to talk again. She then said sorry I didn't quite catch that, do you want to track a package or some other irrelevant option? Since by this time I was sick of trying to talk to a machine through the telephone, especially one as bloody annoying as this one, I emitted an intentionally loud sigh, for dramatic effect, and just hung up. It didn't even occur to me until a bit later to try to get hold of an actual living person somehow. I guess that's okay, in the end, because I don't know if I could have refrained from being unduly cross with them had I actually reached someone who wasn't a computer. As an aside, the bus ride home sucked some particularly scuzzy donkey scrotum today, so I was already more than just a little pissed off (but I don't feel like going into the details of that right now, if ever). I guess being unduly cross with the computer girl was okay, though (so long as she doesn't tell her computer friends and I end up being one of the first ones strung up when the robotic rebellion begins, that is).
In any case, today I received the other, cheaper pair of headphones that I had ordered from them at the same time (but which were sent from a secondary distributer and not Amazon itself, for whatever reason), with none of this kind of fuss whatsoever, so I didn't really need those others anyway. Not that it really matters, but I ordered these two. The Coby ones are the ones that arrived, and the JBuds are the ones that adamantly refused to be delivered.
I decided to vent my frustration by signing the UPS slip anyway, despite the VOID written in the slot, writing an additional "Look, either leave my package or just send it on back to Amazon now. I cannot and will not stay home from work to sign for this in person. It is not possible." on the bottom of it. In the time between the first and the second call to computer hussy, I almost actually went out and stuck it back to the door for whoever would have come tomorrow, but in the end I decided to just call computer bitch again and have them go ahead and return the package to Amazon.
So, I guess I'll be getting a refund from Amazon eventually, as per their policy (according to the otherwise mostly useless email they sent me). If having to sign in person rather than simply signing and leaving the slip like in the past has become standard policy at Amazon or some such crap, then I'll have to carefully consider before I order anything from them again in the future.
I'll probably be getting a "quality assurance" or some such follow-up call from either UPS or Amazon inquiring as to what my "other" reason for returning the package was, in which case I'll have an opportunity to tell them.
And before someone suggests it, no having things delivered to my work isn't really an option for me. And no, there is no one else here who can sign for crap for me, since I live alone.
Here's my deal: I ordered some headphones from Amazon. I got a notice on the door yesterday from UPS saying that they tried to deliver it. However, unlike all of the other such notices I have received in the past for things I've ordered from Amazon, on which I was able to simply sign my signature and then reattach it to the door for the next attempted delivery so that they'd just leave it at the door, this one, for some reason, was marked to indicate that I must sign IN PERSON. And they'd written a big VOID through the place where I'd have signed my name.
So, I sent an email to Amazon's customer service about it yesterday. And got an almost entirely irrelevant form letter this morning as a response.
Well, today, I got another UPS delivery notice, with the same VOID through the signature thing. Tomorrow would have been the final delivery. Simply put, because I can't miss work and stay home just to sign for a pair of headphones, I would have yet again not been here to sign for it. So, I tried to call the number indicated on the UPS slip, in an attempt to try to work something out (maybe a Saturday delivery or something). And I was confronted with an entirely unhelpful and horribly, teeth-gnashingly saccarine computerized voice. It asked me for my tracking number and then politely told me that they'd try to deliver it again tomorrow and then hold it for five days until I could come to them and pick it up, then they'd send it back. I knew this already. Computerized girl asked me if I cared to hear that again, which I did not. Then she gave the option of scheduling a future delivery date, among other options. So I tried that. Then she informed me in a far too bubbly manner that I could choose a day EXCEPT WEEKENDS and holidays, so what day did I want to pick? I had no answer for this, so I hung up and, after several minutes of pointless fuming, I tried again. This time, when faced with the options, I said "Return to sender". Okay, what is your reason for wanting to return to sender, *giggle*. (Obviously, she didn't really giggle, but it wouldn't have surprised me if she had. That's how annoying it was.) My reason ended up being "Other" since "BECAUSE YOU WON'T FUCKING LET ME JUST SIGN THE DAMNED SLIP AND HAVE YOU LEAVE THE THING AT THE DOOR" wasn't one of the options. At this point, she asked me if I had any other business, and I said "No" just as she apparently started to talk again. She then said sorry I didn't quite catch that, do you want to track a package or some other irrelevant option? Since by this time I was sick of trying to talk to a machine through the telephone, especially one as bloody annoying as this one, I emitted an intentionally loud sigh, for dramatic effect, and just hung up. It didn't even occur to me until a bit later to try to get hold of an actual living person somehow. I guess that's okay, in the end, because I don't know if I could have refrained from being unduly cross with them had I actually reached someone who wasn't a computer. As an aside, the bus ride home sucked some particularly scuzzy donkey scrotum today, so I was already more than just a little pissed off (but I don't feel like going into the details of that right now, if ever). I guess being unduly cross with the computer girl was okay, though (so long as she doesn't tell her computer friends and I end up being one of the first ones strung up when the robotic rebellion begins, that is).
In any case, today I received the other, cheaper pair of headphones that I had ordered from them at the same time (but which were sent from a secondary distributer and not Amazon itself, for whatever reason), with none of this kind of fuss whatsoever, so I didn't really need those others anyway. Not that it really matters, but I ordered these two. The Coby ones are the ones that arrived, and the JBuds are the ones that adamantly refused to be delivered.
I decided to vent my frustration by signing the UPS slip anyway, despite the VOID written in the slot, writing an additional "Look, either leave my package or just send it on back to Amazon now. I cannot and will not stay home from work to sign for this in person. It is not possible." on the bottom of it. In the time between the first and the second call to computer hussy, I almost actually went out and stuck it back to the door for whoever would have come tomorrow, but in the end I decided to just call computer bitch again and have them go ahead and return the package to Amazon.
So, I guess I'll be getting a refund from Amazon eventually, as per their policy (according to the otherwise mostly useless email they sent me). If having to sign in person rather than simply signing and leaving the slip like in the past has become standard policy at Amazon or some such crap, then I'll have to carefully consider before I order anything from them again in the future.
I'll probably be getting a "quality assurance" or some such follow-up call from either UPS or Amazon inquiring as to what my "other" reason for returning the package was, in which case I'll have an opportunity to tell them.
And before someone suggests it, no having things delivered to my work isn't really an option for me. And no, there is no one else here who can sign for crap for me, since I live alone.
