Dis-service sector

Episode 1
A few days ago, my CEO threw a dinner party for all staff. I decided to take the wife along, and arrange a babysitter for the boys. I called up one of Sydney’s best known babysitting companies, and reserved a sitter for the night. It was expensive (120 bucks), but I had little choice. A few days later, we learnt that someone known to us through a friend would be available to babysit the kids. Apart from this being much cheaper, it was a great comfort to not to have to leave the kids with a complete stranger.

So I called up the babysitting company to cancel my reservation, one week prior to the actual date. They sweetly informed me that they would cancel, but there would be a 50% cancellation fee. I thought this was really steep, and unacceptable because I hadn’t been informed about any such cancellation charges at the time of reservation. Upon my protest, I was told that as an “exception”, they were willing to waive the cancellation charges this once. It was that simple.

Episode 2
I needed to send my mother in law some documents urgently. I used Australia Post’s most expensive service, Express Courier International, and was assured of delivery within 3 business days. Even after 4 business days, the documents were not delivered, and the much vaunted “tracking” facility obviously wasn’t updated very frequently, because the information on it was at least 2-3 days old. Finally,I somehow managed to track down the documents to a post office in Delhi, and my mother in law had to go there to collect them personally. Certainly not the level of premium service that I had paid for.

Episode 3
This is still ongoing. I lodged a claim with my healthcare insurance provider on May 31st, and was told that the normal processing time is 14 working days. It is now 16 working days since then, and the claim hasn’t been paid. When I call up the insurance company, they can’t tell me very much other than that the claim “is in processing”. Amazingly, this is one of the largest health insurers in Australia and its website does not provide an email address that one can send complaints to. There is only a postal address provided, surely a sinister tactic to discourage any sort of feedback/complaints. Who in this day and age will bother to write letters, for God’s sake?

All these experiences, coinciding over the last 3 weeks have convinced me that on the whole, service companies only pay lip service to the mantra “under-promise and over-deliver”. It’s actually the other way round. Sign up for their services, and as long as your requirements stick to the straight and narrow, things will be fine. The day you need something a little bit out of the ordinary, you are screwed.