I had an interesting discussion with one of the employees in a sport complex. I am not going to name the sport complex, because I like that center, and this incident is not going to change my mind about going there. At least not yet.
There is a device that everyone needs to use in that center. there are only two of them. One of them is not working. More than a year a go when I reported that one of the devices is not working, the employee acted like this is a news and they would look into it.
A year has passed and that device is still not working. I heard from another customer that that device was not working for years now. So, I was a bit surprised why the employee acted like this is a news. Apparently everyone knows that that device is not working. Well, giving the benefit of the doubt, may be that employee is new to that complex as I am and they didn’t know.
But recently I noticed that the other device, the working device, is also starting to show signs that it is about to stop working all together. It works sporadically. So, I decided to report it to the front desk and the employees.
May be they are just too busy and this has not came to their attention.
So, I went to the front desk and said that one of the devices was not working for more than a year now and the other one my guess is that it is about to give up very soon.
The employee responded that the device is working; Both of them. They just used it last Friday. But sometimes it stops working; and sometimes it works.
I doubt that both are working. That employee definitely didn’t use the device that everyone was saying it is not working. So, I asked the employee if they could show me how to use the device that I think is broken and is not working. The response was that, well, they might try it now and it might not work. But they assured me that it works because they have tried it and sometimes it works.
This is really a new definition of a working device.
So, I told the employee if they have a car and sometimes it starts and sometime it doesn’t, they should not claim that the car starts, because sometimes it starts. Could I pay my dues only sometimes, and when they tell me that I am not paying my dues, I claim that I do pay my dues to this complex because sometime I pay? I don’t think so.
This reminds me of another incident. I remember in another work place, I brought to the attention of one of the employees that it seems that the sink in one of the restrooms is not draining properly. They asked me if the water is stopped? I said, no. It is not. It is draining. But slower than usual. I even offered that if they are busy to put a service request call, I can do that, if they tell me who I should call or how I can get that information. The response was that: not needed. Come back if the water was stopped and not draining at all.
Few days later when I walked in to the office, I noticed big fans in the corridor in the first floor. The same situation on the second floor. What was going on? The sink apparently had been blocked and some other pipe issue and two floors was flooded. I asked which restroom, and someone said the restroom on the second floor. Yes, the same one that I warned that something is not right with it. It needs to be checked and serviced.
It was a mess for a couple of days! When I saw the employee that I was just telling them this needs to be serviced, they were avoiding eye contact and I could say that I don’t even need to tell them: “I told you so!”.
Let’s see when this device in that sport center stops working and everyone goes crazy.
You might think, that I am implicitly claiming that the employee is lying that they used the broken device just recently. Well, I ended up asking for manager. The manager said that one of the devices (the broken one) has faulty wiring and they are aware that it is not working. The manager also mentioned that the other one that is about to stop working is almost at the end of its life time. The thing is that apparently it costs close to $30K to have them both replaced; and they are looking into doing that when their budget allows it. This is a perfectly acceptable response! not ideal but acceptable. Those devices don’t look like to be that expensive. But I am not an expert on their prices, so I take their word for it. Be honest with the customer. If you are not able to solve an issue, being honest to them is the least you can do. We are human; we understand. But if you try to BS your way out, beside providing bad service, you loose our trust on top of that. Improving the quality of your service is easy. But earning the trust back is much harder, if not impossible. It is certainly exponentially harder than the first time that you needed to earn someone’s trust.