Or maybe a reason to hate what store managers have become.

Yesterday, I went to Staples to pick up a couple of cheap prepaid long
distance phone cards, anticipating some lengthly conference calls
while I'm on a trip next week. I like to give the company a break
rather than have them pay for the outrageous markup on a long distance
call from a hotel room and this is a sensible way to do it that gives
me a receipt for reimbursement.

So anyway, the deal was two 75 minute cards for $10. I picked up the
two two from the pile and went to the register to check out. I had a
couple of other things that I wanted rung up separately, so there were
two transactions. I didn't pay attention to the credit card total when
I signed it (you know, scanned, computers never make mistakes . . . )
That was my fault. I should have caught it there.

So I get home, peel the glue off the cards and get ready to put them
in my travel bag when I notice that one of them is a 150 minute card.
I look at the receipt and see that instead of $10.45, it's for
$21.something, with one card at $7.49 (the regular price of a 75
minute card, even though the "special" sign said, below the $10 for
two price "$5 for one"), and the other card for $13.49. This morning I
went back to the store with the receipt and the cards to straighten it
out. The nice lady at the customer service counter apologized for the
confusion and said she'd just give me a refund for the 150 minute
card, and let me keep it for my trouble.

So she started scanning and punching numbers into the computer, and it
told her that the card couldn't be returned. So she called the
mangager over to see if he could make it work. He was only willing to
refund both cards and sell me new ones, but since that was all I was
really entitled to, I said OK and he got to work. He tried a couple of
times and couldn't make the computer accept the refund either. I
suggested that perhaps it was because there was no way to tell whether
I had used the cards or not, so he called the access phone number and
verified that the cards still had their original value, but still, he
couldn't override the computer's refusal to process the return.

Finally he phoned someone else, explained the situation, and got a
number which I assumed was some authorization from on high that
allowed him to override the program. When he handed me the credit
receipt, it was for the correct amount, but the item refunded wasn't
the phone cards, it was "Self service copy center."

If a real person was allowed to make decisions, this would have been
simple and taken just a minute instead of involving three people (not
counting the automated response to confirm that the cards were unused)
and about twenty minutes.

This reminds me of a song on Ricky Scaggs' new live album called "I
Live The Simple Life." He sings about a little home, a nice family,
the bible, and then ends up with:

"A cell phone when my old car dies"
"The Internet to show me where, a GPS to show me where"

Gimme the simple life.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )

So anyway, the deal was two 75 minute cards for $10.

Or you could have gone to Costco and got 670 minutes for 19.99!



---------------------------------------
"I know enough to know I don't know enough"

Mike Rivers wrote:

This reminds me of a song on Ricky Scaggs' new live album called "I
Live The Simple Life." He sings about a little home, a nice family,
the bible, and then ends up with:

"A cell phone when my old car dies"
"The Internet to show me where, a GPS to show me where"

Great song, written by Harley Allen (Red Allen's son). You can hear
Ricky sing it live tonight on the folk festival webcast that I mentioned
in my earlier post. (Actually, its "....a GPS to get me there".) Of
course, since the festival took place less than a week after Ricky
recorded his live album, it won't sound much different from the record g.

Oh man I hear ya- overly dependent and rigid computer world we have created.
Thank goodness things never stay the same- too bad changes sometimes take
decades!



C

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message
news:znr1062265016k@trad...

Or maybe a reason to hate what store managers have become.

Yesterday, I went to Staples to pick up a couple of cheap prepaid long
distance phone cards, anticipating some lengthly conference calls
while I'm on a trip next week. I like to give the company a break
rather than have them pay for the outrageous markup on a long distance
call from a hotel room and this is a sensible way to do it that gives
me a receipt for reimbursement.

So anyway, the deal was two 75 minute cards for $10. I picked up the
two two from the pile and went to the register to check out. I had a
couple of other things that I wanted rung up separately, so there were
two transactions. I didn't pay attention to the credit card total when
I signed it (you know, scanned, computers never make mistakes . . . )
That was my fault. I should have caught it there.

So I get home, peel the glue off the cards and get ready to put them
in my travel bag when I notice that one of them is a 150 minute card.
I look at the receipt and see that instead of $10.45, it's for
$21.something, with one card at $7.49 (the regular price of a 75
minute card, even though the "special" sign said, below the $10 for
two price "$5 for one"), and the other card for $13.49. This morning I
went back to the store with the receipt and the cards to straighten it
out. The nice lady at the customer service counter apologized for the
confusion and said she'd just give me a refund for the 150 minute
card, and let me keep it for my trouble.

So she started scanning and punching numbers into the computer, and it
told her that the card couldn't be returned. So she called the
mangager over to see if he could make it work. He was only willing to
refund both cards and sell me new ones, but since that was all I was
really entitled to, I said OK and he got to work. He tried a couple of
times and couldn't make the computer accept the refund either. I
suggested that perhaps it was because there was no way to tell whether
I had used the cards or not, so he called the access phone number and
verified that the cards still had their original value, but still, he
couldn't override the computer's refusal to process the return.

Finally he phoned someone else, explained the situation, and got a
number which I assumed was some authorization from on high that
allowed him to override the program. When he handed me the credit
receipt, it was for the correct amount, but the item refunded wasn't
the phone cards, it was "Self service copy center."

If a real person was allowed to make decisions, this would have been
simple and taken just a minute instead of involving three people (not
counting the automated response to confirm that the cards were unused)
and about twenty minutes.

This reminds me of a song on Ricky Scaggs' new live album called "I
Live The Simple Life." He sings about a little home, a nice family,
the bible, and then ends up with:

"A cell phone when my old car dies"
"The Internet to show me where, a GPS to show me where"

Gimme the simple life.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )

Mike,

Very rarely it's the computer. Sometimes it's the programmer. Usually it's
the manager who specified how the program should work.

--Ethan

In article writes:

Or you could have gone to Costco and got 670 minutes for 19.99!

Not counting what it costs to join Costco. I still haven't decided
that I can spend enough money there to pay for the membership fee.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )

In article writes:

(Actually, its "....a GPS to get me there".)

I knew that.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )

(Mike Rivers) wrote in news:znr1062265016k@trad:

If a real person was allowed to make decisions, this would have been
simple and taken just a minute instead of involving three people (not
counting the automated response to confirm that the cards were unused)
and about twenty minutes.

All that takes is a real programmer writing a real override into the
software. Don't blame it on "the computer", blame it on the programmer, or
perhaps the programmer's supervisor who was afraid the override could be
abused.

--Carey Carlan
professional programmer

On Sun, 31 Aug 2003 12:38:59 GMT, Carey Carlan
wrote:

(Mike Rivers) wrote in news:znr1062265016k@trad:

If a real person was allowed to make decisions, this would have been
simple and taken just a minute instead of involving three people (not
counting the automated response to confirm that the cards were unused)
and about twenty minutes.

All that takes is a real programmer writing a real override into the
software. Don't blame it on "the computer", blame it on the programmer, or
perhaps the programmer's supervisor who was afraid the override could be
abused.

Or to be fair the intended customers for the software, who may have
been consulted before the software was written, and made it clear that
they didn't want such an override in the software.

Doughboy

Not counting what it costs to join Costco. I still haven't decided
that I can spend enough money there to pay for the membership fee.

Good point.

Check out their gas prices next time you drive by.



---------------------------------------
"I know enough to know I don't know enough"

In article "Ethan Winer" ethan at ethanwiner dot com writes:

Very rarely it's the computer. Sometimes it's the programmer. Usually it's
the manager who specified how the program should work.

Almost certainly in this case it was a decision not just of the local
manager, but one of policy for the chain of stores. Kind of like
Guitar Centers not accepting returns on microphones (but if they trust
you and want to keep your business, they can work around it).

It's just that the computer's action seemed to frustrate the customer
service clerk and also the local manager. Neither had ever taken a
return on a prepaid phone card before and apparently neither knew that
the system was programmed not to accept one.

I went through four or five computer bags at this same Staples store
(and I'm still looking for one that fits my computer and lifestyle)
and they never had a problem with those returns. And one time when
they gave me the wrong disk drive when I was buying one with a rebate,
when I discovered it after cutting off the UPC sticker to include with
the rebate coupon (at that point noticing that the numbers were
different), the manager on duty that day did a bogus "price match" for
me, crediting the difference between the price I paid and the price
after the rebate - more than generous since I got a drive with a
larger buffer and didn't have to wait for the rebate check to come.

So in general that store has been good to me. Probably if the manager
who handled the disk drive problem had been there the day I went to
exchange the phone cards, he would have simply refunded my money and
told me to keep the cards. But different days, different managers,
different policies. It shouldn't be that way of course, but it's nice
that at least some are still willing to exercise their authority as a
manager and, when there's a mistake, make the customer feel maybe a
little happier than if everything had gone right with the purchase.



--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )

In article writes:

True, but that's a business decision, not an inherent result of
computerization.

Correct, and if I were dealing with a cashier who has no authority to
do anything beyond ring up sales and make change, I would have no
problem with it. But the reason why stores have managers is that
there's a person who can make decisions other than those which are
programmed by the policy-makers.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )

(Mike Rivers) wrote in news:znr1062340161k@trad:


In article writes:

True, but that's a business decision, not an inherent result of
computerization.

Correct, and if I were dealing with a cashier who has no authority to
do anything beyond ring up sales and make change, I would have no
problem with it. But the reason why stores have managers is that
there's a person who can make decisions other than those which are
programmed by the policy-makers.

Either way you can blame it on the home office. Leaving the override out
of the software on purpose indicates that the company has no trust in their
managers. If not on purpose ...

On 31 Aug 2003 17:17:26 -0400, (Mike Rivers)
wrote:

I don't have room to
store 96 rolls of toilet paper unless I can prove that it has good
acoustical qualities.


If you soak a roll of toilet paper, it makes quite an impact when
shot out of a big potato gun.You could use them up quicker, and have
some fun too.

I agree some of the bulk stuff is overkill.When you see Sams Club drop
off a pallet of tampons, it is getting out of hand.

Randall

If a real person was allowed to make decisions, this would have been
simple and taken just a minute instead of involving three people (not
counting the automated response to confirm that the cards were unused)
and about twenty minutes.


I went to Mervyns a week or two ago and wanted to buy some Levi shorts. The
first batch I found was all blue. Hey, I love blue for 6 days a week, but
wanted green. So I picked up a few. They were marked $32 a pair (yow!).
Later on, I find in the same store, but on the discount rack, a single pair
of green 550s or whatever fits me. Everything about the green was the same
as the blue, but for the obvious color difference. Hey, they were both 550s,
same size and all, not irregular or anything. But the green was priced for
something like $20 or so.

So of course I try to reason this at the register, wanting to see if I could
negotiate the more expensive blues down to the green price. No deal. Only
the color is different (on the actual product) and therefore the price is
$12 apart. The SKU was different, and that made all the diff in the world. I
don¹t know what is more robotic-- the computer or the people who slavishly
bow down to its might and intellectual superiority.

Its a good thing I like my blue shorts a lot.


--

TAPKAE
http://tapkae.com

"We're the cleanup crew for parties we were too young to attend"
(Kevin Gilbert)

And just wait until you get screwed by the phone card company. Wait
until they charge you a minimum $1 for each call. Wait until they
deduct $1/week service fee.

I once got a phone card. I used it for a 3 minute call and then it
was expired. That was the first and last time. (or next time I will
very carefully research the cards).

Rob R.
(Yes, I prefer microphones to ocelots...now we've talked audio.)

On 2003-09-02 said:
And just wait until you get screwed by the phone card company. Wait
until they charge you a minimum $1 for each call. Wait until they
deduct $1/week service fee.
I once got a phone card. I used it for a 3 minute call and then it
was expired. That was the first and last time. (or next time I
will very carefully research the cards).
FOund this to be true also. rEcently I bought one of those phone
cards from a national drug store chain which doesn't do that to you
and I actually got some reasonable value for my money on it. I can
recharge hte card even in $10 increments and keep the same durned pin
number.

slightly on topic, have you noticed that many of those phone card
services really do some bad things to the audio by the time your
connection is made? tHis one doesn't seem to do bad in that
department either.

Regards,



Richard Webb
Electric Spider Productions
REplace anything before the @ symbol with elspider for real email

--



Amazing how much tape is on a 10" reel, when it's not, isn't it?

Computers just make it faster/more convienent to implement stupid policies.