Customer service has gone down-hill! I have worked in customer service for almost 10 years now and I am horrified when I call another company and am treated like a neusence. What ever happened to "the customer is always right"? Companies are lacking propor training of their reps. and it is a job with a high rate of burn-out. Where I work, there are three girls who rotate phone coverage. Each has another duty on the side that they enjoy (example: I do the marketing) I find that by giving each of us another responsibility, it gives us each a break from customer service and alows us to learn a new trade. I love the marketing so much that I will be doing it full time as of next month. More companies should think of doing this because all of our reps are happy....which translates into happy customers.

There was once a time when people understood that when you dealt face-to-face with a customer you were there to listen and deliver the best possible service.
I would shop there and even pay more to be treated properly.
Can anyone tell me where to get customer service anymore?
I get tired very easily of the 15 year old pimple-faced, gum chewing checkout person who greets me with "yair?"
Even the traditional, large "classy" retailer, you know the one, has a customer service level equal to the traditionally lower ones and they make no apologies for the fact that they have let it slide.
Here's an interesting marketing idea for all those aspiring service industries...BRING BACK CUSTOMER SERVICE!
You'll get my business!

It seems to me there is a fairly simple fix. Enshrine it in law that companies must include in all their literature, contact details which provide direct access to someone with authority to make decisions. Not an answering machine, not some clerk who will take messages but incapable of dealing with anything themselves and most especially, not 20 minutes of "hold" music.

Why should companies like Telstra, and the banks be able make outrageous demands of people and then hide behind answering machines until most people simply give up. There is no good reason why the law can't address this.

It is time we all started voting with our wallets and only support companies that deliver excellent costomer service.
Then see if someone can keep you on hold or arguing for four hours until they sort out and correct their billing error!
The company I refer to starts with a T, ends with an A and has a large amount to do with phones.If they don't know how to give customer service, give the job to someone that does!

Voting with your wallet is all well and good in a competitive market, but most large companies like Telstra, Optus, the banks, Energy Australia, etc all have virtually identical practices of hiding all their decision makers behind a facade of answering machines, or customer relations people with inadequate knowledge or authority to actually deal with customer problems.

Competition theory alone does not appear to be able to address this. The threat of fines for this sort of behaviour might just do the trick.