Customer Service - dos and don'ts

We had the Direct TV guy come today to move our DVR (no more bedroom TV watching - sob). This guy was quiet, quick, efficient, and even came up with a way to save us a little bit of money. I was very impressed, seeing that the last episode I had with a service technician in the house was a disaster. I meant to do a post about it when it happened, but I may have blocked the episode out for awhile.

The guy poorly trained in Customer Service worked for our A/C and Heater service company. He was supposed to come twice a year, once in the spring to check out the A/C, and once in the fall to look at the heater. He had already been here twice, and had managed to piss me off both times. He had a very smug demeanor and was constantly talking about the fact that he just KNEW he had been in our house before and remembered our unit, but never about anything substantial, like how said unit was working and holding up. The second time he was here, he noticed we had a wasps' nest on our back porch and offered to spray it for me. I know he was trying to be nice, but I like our wasps to be around. I may be weird, but I like not disturbing the ecosystem of our yard. We don't bother them, and they don't bother us. So I said, no thank you, I'd rather he not spray them. He pressed a few more times, and I politely held my ground. And he left.

So the last time he came, I should have remembered this exchange and watched him closer. First off, he kept complaining that we had a faulty thermostat. I told him what the trick was to set it, but he just kept complaining about it. So when he was almost done, I asked him what should I do about the faulty thermostat. He said that I should probably get a new one. Well, you can't pay for advice like that, my friend. Not a word about how or where, or that they didn't sell them but I could go to Lowe's, or anything.

THEN as he was walking back inside from his truck where he had written up my bill, he noticed our wasp nest on the front porch. He then took it upon himself to spray a mother lode of pesticide all over the nest and anything else within a 10 foot radius. He then proudly told me what he had done, and I was so mad I could only look at him. Which is the thing that really made me the maddest, that I couldn't lay into him like I really wanted to that this was MY house and how dare he do something like that without asking and that we never use chemicals around the baby, etc.... No, I just sat in stunned angry silence and signed the service agreement then watched him drive away, as he probably thought to himself what a wonderful person he was for helping out a helpless female who didn't even know she had a huge wasp nest on her front porch.

Needless to say, Jav is currently looking for a new A/C and heater service company. And I need to work on not being afraid to shout at people if they deserve it. Except for if it's my husband.