They messed up, then dissed the competition

I just transferred a URL I bought years ago to GoDaddy.com, a domain company that manages most of my other domain names. Yes, it's an American company, with a silly name and annoyingly sexist advertising, but its prices are cheap and its customer service is outstanding.

(Example: A year ago, one of their Customer Service reps noticed that I had never got around to using a monthly hosting service I had bought and paid for - so he offered me a refund on the spot. No one else, in any business, has ever offered to do that for me. Just yesterday, I realized I had bought another service I didn't need, and GoDaddy's CSR helpfully showed me how to cancel it and get my money back.)

But this is a blog about stupid business, so let's look at the company I no longer wanted to deal with: Misk.com. It inherited my account when it bought a previous company I had registered with, so I had no loyalty to it - or any problem with it either.

But Misk annoyed me with its poor online customer service documentation. I couldn't find the way to renew the URL. And when I dialled the help number on their website, I learned that their hotline is for faxes only. All other inquiries must come via email.

So a week ago I emailed Misk for help, and didn't hear back. I sent a second email saying this issue was important to me, and asking for a response within 24 hours. Nada.

I finally heard from them late last night - four and a half days after my second email. (Meantime, the transfer had gone through, thank goodness.) Here's what the service rep said:

"We apologize for the delay in responding to you. Due to a technical issue with our ticketing system, your email was misdirected and not yet answered." An online company that loses customers' email? Heads should roll.

But here's the kicker. The service rep said this: "Ca domains are much different than others and clearly your new registrar doesn't have much experience with .CA domains (GoDaddy) only recently starting registering these. You may want to pick another more experienced and ethical registrar."

Wow. What are they trying to say here? In my opinion, GoDaddy's ethics are better than most, and its support teams very experienced and knowledgeable. GoDaddy is now by far the largest domain registrar in the world, so of course there have been controversies, but no deep ethical problems that a competitor should be pointing out.

For its poor service and weirdly inappropriate bad-mouthing of the competition, Misk.com definitely deserves our mantra: New Management Welcome.

Management Fail!

Failblog.org is a site that mixes irony and humour with everyday glimpses, primarily through photographs, of places and things that are just wrong. It chronicles the failures and foibles of individuals, but also the dysfunction of organizations.

Just for fun, here are a few recent photos from the site that prove that way too many businesses and organizations are in desperate need of New Management.

You can check out more Fail photos at Failblog.org

Closing the Door on BookCloseouts.com

I was just browsing this month's scratch-and-dent sale at http://www.bookcloseouts.com/. My first time on the site.

I saw a book I liked and clicked on the "Add to cart" button. You know what I got? A screen that said, "Your shopping cart is empty." So I went back and clicked again. My shopping cart was still empty.

Perhaps I should have registered and logged in first. Well, why didn't they say that early on? And why don't they give me that option now? Why not make things dead easy for first timers?

Instead they gave me a nonsensical warning and no clear path to do anything about it.

I think I'll take my business to a website that understands customer care.
New Management Welcome.

United Airlines: Breaker of Guitars, and Hearts

Note to big companies, and UAL baggage handlers in particular: Don't piss off Halifax musician Dave Carroll. He's liable to write a song about it, and that could go viral...

Note to smart marketers: Sure, Dave is angry that they busted his guitar. But he's even more upset at the airline's inability to take any responsibilty - or even just show remorse. What's so wrong with saying, "Sorry"?

UPDATE: United seems to be paying attention. Sure, now they're willing to talk...
Click here for the story.

"A Little Glitch in the System"

The other day I ordered some ink cartridges for my mother from an online retailer through eBay. The price was good, their feedback was hugely positive. But when I tried to check out, I couldn’t. The system told me “This order has no products associated with it.”

So I emailed the company to let them know I had a problem. I got a prompt and reassuring reply from someone named Janice:

"We had a little glitch in the system, which we have fixed. If you would like to try the checkout again, it should work this time. If it doesn’t please let me know and I will send you a PayPal request for the item."

So I tried again, And this time, in addition to the “no products” response, the system told me that “The company you are trying to pay does not have paypal account set up correctly.”

So I emailed Janice back, adding a screen shot of the offending error messages. This time my reply came from the President of the company. But it wasn't very reassuring.

“From our end, when we try to do the checkout there is no problem… In the meantime, would you like to pay direct to our PayPal account?”

I responded “yes,” but with a pithy note that “I am pleased you're not having any problem. Unfortunately, I am the customer, not you. And it's not fixed.”

48 hours later I am still waiting to hear back.

Why does management think that I care if the system works for them? If I've tried five times and it's not working, they should own the problem until it's fixed.

How much is that again?

A discount store in New Jersey demonstrates the importance of unified branding.

(Note the discordant theme continues in the window posters as well as the roof signs. At least they're consistently inconsistent.)

(Poached from Consumerist.com)

Be Afraid. Be very, very afraid

What do you do when big government and big business are equally stupid?

Case in point: Insurance giant AIG paying more than $165 million in bonuses following its receipt of billions in bailout money. Sure, the money is mainly a "retention investment," to keep talented employees from walking. But when your entire industry is imploding, and competitors are melting down, bonuses such as these are ridiculous. It's symbolic of the common sense and moral meltdown of Wall Street in the first place.

But the U.S. Congress and President Obama should not be getting so self-righteously angry about this whole thing, either. These bonuses were negotiated months ago. The leigislators grilling AIC CEO Edward Liddy in Washington today are the same bozos who approved the bailout. They don't seem to understand that their bailout enabled the company to go forward with the previously approved bonuses.

Makes you wonder what else they don't understand about the billions of tax dollars they're throwing at bailouts and miscellaneous pork-barrel stimulus packages.