A Perfect Response

The problem: Acceris Communications Partners has been billing us for someone else's phone. We discontinued service in 2001, but Acceris started sending bills for our OLD number 2 years later. $356 so far. Collection agency letters, harassing automated phone messages.

Within six days, Acceris e-mailed CX that it would do everything the consumer asked:

Thank you for your notification of improper billing. The consumer is correct. He was our customer and in 2001 cancelled service with us.

It appears in June 2003 the number was reassigned. The person receiving the new number began using our services on June 2003 thru Oct. 2003. Since we allow our customers to casually access our network, we believed that the name on the account still belonged to the current user. Unfortunate assumption on our part. For that I do apologize and I called and left the consumer a message stating we were sorry for the error.

My intentions are to also credit him the $43.00 for the cost of this complaint to you.

I would appreciate consideration for a good rating at your web site www.CX.org.

When CX followed-up to be sure that any unfavorable credit information had been eliminated, Acceris replied that none had been reported.

CX thanked the Senior Vice President handling the complaint, assured her that Acceris would get a fine responsiveness rating from CX and a thank-you letter telling how they could check that. "We're glad you recognize that CX can help consumers identify companies that skillfully handle the glitches that are inevitable when working with large number of consumers."

She replied,

I am a very technical person, not a collection person, and I have a feeling I noticed the technical issue that probably was not recognized by the collection department.

I also recognize it is important for consumers to have an organization such as yours. I personally had an issue with a credit card company who would not remove some false charges and I have never missed a payment in 30 years. However, the person(s) I dealt with failed to dig and for more than a year I was agonizing about a $3,500 false charge. I wish I had known about organizations such as yours.

The check will go out tomorrow or Monday at the latest. Our finance dept. is in another state so we put a huge rush on this check.

The consumer e-mailed CX: "I will definitely recommend you to anyone with consumer related problems. More power."

Creative, Relentless

When the consumer has a problem with a firm that is extremely unresponsive, CX looks for another firm that might help the consumer.

For a consumer stonewalled by a company now processing her store credit card, CX recommended also sending a complaint to the store's parent company, which had owned the bank issuing the card. The CX complaint said:

Spiegel's Newport News issued me a credit card which, since Spiegel's bankruptcy, has been overbilling me and refusing to respond to calls or letters. Spiegel is still linked in customers' minds with the card and needs to correct the predatory billing.

CX added: "You need to fix this, even if the account no longer belongs to you, because you started the process which got her tangled up with the people mishandling the account."

Thirteen days after CX faxed, Spiegel called to say that Card Processing Center had agreed to reduce her balance.

Card Services wrote saying they would waive $735 in fees "provided a payment of $720 is made" within two weeks.

When she called, no one knew about the letter. CX faxed Spiegel again:

As a result of your intervention, Card Processing offered to reduce the improper charges but:

Card Processing is demanding that the consumer pay them $700 by Thursday without basic safeguards.

We can't find anyone who knows about the letter offering the reduction, can tell what will be owed or even assure that the money will be properly applied.

It shouldn't be so risky, stressful and expensive to remove the improper charges from the account.

Minimally, all we need is someone there to make standard prudent arrangements for payment. To generate the good will which motivated your intervention, all we need is a billing adjustment reducing the amount owed by the offered amount.

I greatly appreciate your intervention which made this possible. I hope you can intervene once more to make this happen.

Spiegel called the consumer back. The caller was sorry, but said she had done all she could.

The consumer talked to CX about the risk of making the payment and decided to send it.

Days later, she e-mailed CX:

You will never believe this!! I was very very surprised anyway.

I got a letter from Card Processing stating they had received my payment. And that they would remove $837 from my bill. This is MORE than the original agreement of $735.

I got a 2nd letter the next day stating that they had instructed the credit report companies to "remove all derogatory comments from my credit record".

Thank you from the bottom of my heart!!

Then another e-mail:

I got a new letter from Card Processing Center. It said they would be refunding me my overpayment once the amount was determined.

So it seems that someone there is trying at last to do something right. I did not expect to get anything back.

I got the copies of the settlement thank you's that you sent [to all 3 firms.]

Thanks for everything.

A Short Story

Problem: The CNBC University seminar cost $3,500 for harmful, counter-productive investment advice.

Strategy: CX complaints to InvesTools and Online Investors Advantage (which ran the seminars), CNBC (which sold them the right to use the CNBC name) and General Electric (which owns most of NBC which owns CNBC.)

Result: CX faxed Thursday. Resolved Monday with apology, 100% refund ($3,500) and 2 follow-up calls to CX from a Vice President to be sure all the CX complaints are settled.

Consumer comment: After weeks of calling "customer service", all it took was one fax and letter from ConsumerXchange, and cnbcu called me! She apologized and assured me that this was not the way cnbcu does business and that I would receive a full refund. I don't know how you did it! You were able to get in touch with the right people and get my problem handled correctly. This would not have happened without your help. CX is real help from a real person who really cares. CX's calls were quick and I was impressed by the calls to keep me updated. Thank you to a great company for such great service.

Lawyer fails; CX works

What would happen if consumers brought the same problem to both CX and the best alternative?

This happened with a couple trying to get their deposit back quickly from a landlord who didn't have their apartment finished by the promised date.

They first tried an experienced lawyer. The lawyer had several conversations with the broker who had negotiated the lease and accepted the check, explaining that the broker had the highest possible legal obligation ("a fiduciary duty") to not spend the deposit money and to return it.

The lawyer made it clear that the broker was violating the real estate broker law and that his clients could ask the state to take away his license.

The broker refused to pay. The landlord didn't answer the lawyer's calls. Eventually, the consumers' lawyer met with the landlord's lawyer.

The landlord's lawyer read the lease and looked at the consumers' pictures of the apartment (with the toilet in the living room and the kitchen sink in the yard.) There was no disagreement about applicable law. The landlord's lawyer said he would call his client and do his best. "You'll just have to do what you have to do" (which is how a lawyer tells a colleague, without violating ethical duties, that his client is rejecting his advice and won't pay until sued.)

The consumers' lawyer followed-up. No progress. No hope for short-term success.

Then the consumers went on CX.org.

CX Complaints reached the post office Friday.

The broker delivered the landlord's check on Monday.

A Valuable Reality Check

CX's experience, knowledge and contacts help consumers determine whether they have a complaint worth sending and how to weigh the companies' responses.

At the same time, CX helps businesses by screening out complaints that appear unfounded. When a business responds to a complaint by convincingly showing CX that the consumer is mistaken, CX will encourage the consumer to accept that reality and will post any necessary corrective information.

Businesses need to know that consumers only bring CX complaints when they feel strongly that they didn't get what they paid for. Typically, customers know what happened to them better than the business. When, on rare occasions, CX or the business shows them that the facts were different from what they perceived, most are eager to change their position.

Complaint Aborted

She called CX because her surgeon said he thought her emergency surgery to remove a blood clot was the result of her over-exertion while exercising using an Ab Wheel. She had a $10,000 medical bill.

CX interviewed a hematologist and an experienced exercise trainer, then her surgeon.

All agreed that there was not a likely connection between such a clot and the device.

CX updated the consumer. She said she did not want to send the complaint and was glad to have the additional information.

Complaint Withdrawn

A consumer bought a sports car with 4,000 miles and then discovered the tires looked totally bald.

CX complaints went to the dealer, the car maker and the tire maker. Both manufacturers contacted the dealer. The owner of the dealer called CX and sent pictures and measurements of the tire tread. The consumer visited the dealer to check tires.

He came to understand that the latest sport car tires look bald even when new. CX wrote the firms:

The consumer, after exploring the issue and talking to people at the dealer, has decided to withdraw his complaint.

CX is grateful to each of you for helping to resolve this problem.

As requested, we will not post your names on the CX web site for this complaint.

The consumer was happy with the process and result.

Complaint Mistaken

The CX complaint:

Town Pump sold me diesel fuel in Superior MT. After 1.5 miles my vehicle lost power. A mechanic said there was water in the fuel. Town Pump said they'd take care of me. But they only paid $50 of my $200 repair cost.

Town Pump responded within minutes with a phone call and a fax of test results and procedures to prevent water in their tanks. They also interviewed the mechanic cited by the consumer, reporting a different opinion.

Exxon also responded, offering evidence that if there had been water in the vehicle's gas tank from the refueling, it would have stalled right at the gas station.

CX phoned and e-mailed the consumer, but got no response. CX then wrote the firms:

CX has accepted your explanation.

Congratulations on you on how well you responded to us.

CX evaluated your response to the enclosed complaint and has decided to consider the complaint resolved by your explanation.

ConsumerXchange published this on www.CX.org to help consumers buy wisely, our shared objective.

While almost all CX complaints are well-founded, this shows that we are open to information showing that the facts were not what the consumer perceived.

Together, we can help consumers recognize the responsible, responsive businesses.

CX posted the complaint as resolved and summarized the firm's response:

Town Pump responded the day CX faxed, providing information (which CX found credible) showing that the consumer's engine problems were not caused by its diesel fuel. Impressive response.

Business Lawyers

Wise attorneys tell their corporate clients:

• How strongly the law protects the right of CX and consumers to share complaint information;
  
  
• How counterproductive it would be to try to silence CX or their own customers.

Rarely, good judgment is overcome and CX receives something like this:

Our client believes the allegations, as reported in your letter, are factually incorrect, defamatory and/or slanderous, and, if further publicized, will cause damage to it's business, good will and reputation.

CX then calmly replies like this:

ConsumerXchange is a responsible publisher, committed to fairly presenting the facts as seen by both your client and these consumers.

We will therefore publish your letter in full on the CX web site at the same time we publish the consumers' complaint about your client.

We believe that consumers need to hear both sides and are then able to evaluate the claims of each.

This is protected by the Constitution's first amendment. We strongly object to your attempt to chill the rights of consumers to share information.

If your client deserves a good reputation it must earn it from consumers who are free to learn about its actions from consumers who are free to speak without corporate intimidation.

This consumer is obviously telling the truth as personally experienced, so you cannot be taken seriously when you call her a liar or assert grounds to sue.

I understand that she phoned you to give you facts which you apparently overlooked in concluding that her claim lacked merit, but you are declining to talk to her.

I encourage you to make your client's customers happy and your client's reputation better than it looks now.

Tone-deaf lawyers can be a customer relations nightmare.

For example, a lawyer wrote CX that the home fire caused by an installer wasn't serious because the insurance company hadn't paid much to the consumer, whose major complaint, of course, was that the underinsured installer hadn't paid for their losses.

One frustrated lawyer left hostile post-midnight messages attacking CX and threatening the career of a CX advocate.

CX played the tape to the Chief Executive Officer.

The CEO apologized for the lawyer's conduct. He said that, after a hard conversation, she apologized and realized she made a mistake. "That's not the way this company operates." The law firm would not be paid for the time.

Redeeming itself, the company agreed to solve the CX consumers' entire problem.

The consumers had paid an incompetent installer to resurface their floors with the company's product. The installer wouldn't respond. The company initially offered to give the consumers the products needed, despite the fact that the original products were not defective.

Now, the company agreed to refinish the floors. "We're going to turn it into a very positive situation." Their Director of Training will go in with some of their people to make it a demonstration or test project.

The value to the consumers is much more than the $1,550 they had asked for.

Lesson Learned: the company needs to focus on making the CX consumer happy, not on futilely lawyering the problem.

Mutual Respect

Businesses too often fail to meet a consumer's needs for respect. CX focuses on what each consumer actually wants. Often the key ingredient to satisfying a consumer is simply an acknowledgment of their unanticipated inconvenience or hardship, together with an apology.

This approach was especially clear when a businessman asked CX to help two young Japanese visitors with a dealership for a Japanese car maker. The salesperson had promised them a $2,000 government check if they bought a hybrid, but the law actually provided a tax deduction worth much less. Familiar with Japan, the businessman said that such behavior would not be permitted by the car maker in Japan.

The CX complaint asked the dealer to acknowledge the problem (with specific remedies to insure it doesn't happen to others) and a check for that $2,000 (preferably from the salesperson's personal account.)

The dealer apologized, said they would change their procedures and paid an agreed $912.50 (partially paid by the salesperson.)

Consumer reaction: "This was a long shot....I was amazed."

Upon confronting management with the situation, they ultimately admitted some culpability in the matter. After discussing the problem with the dealership's manager and the salesman, I'm convinced that this was just a case of a young salesman being a wee bit overly aggressive and management not making sure the sales force fully understood the cost savings programs available.

However, I also agreed with the dealership's manager that Koji and Nanako (the brother and sister I was helping with this problem) had some culpability as well. We did finally agree on restitution and the dealership did in fact pay them. Everyone's happy? Probably not, but it was a fair agreement.

I don't doubt that the dealership felt flanking pressure from the letter CX sent as well as the the State's Attorney's office. It's good to know there are still organizations out there that actually believe in moral causes.

I'd like to thank you for your help in resolving this matter. You were diligent in your follow up letters and at least he knew you and I weren't going away without a fight.

In all fairness, Schaumburg Honda's manager was certainly amenable to listening to our side of the story and was always courteous and respectful during our conversations. While I feel the whole situation could have been avoided, I have a good degree of confidence in their assertion that they will review their policies in every effort to avoid another problem.

Bottom line, I'd buy another car from them.

Thanks again for all your help.

Government?

While CX is narrowly targeted at consumer's problems with businesses, on rare occasions we couldn't resist pushing the government. Here's what Medicare (CMS) did:

[The consumer] states that she was misled into enrolling in United Healthcare Medicare Advantage plan. She wants to return to traditional Medicare instead.

We contacted United Healthcare and verified that she had not used the plan. We took the necessary action to cancel the enrollment and notified United Healthcare.

All claims for medical services may now be submitted to traditional Medicare for processing.

If you have any questions, please contact me or my staff.

Sometimes it even looks easy....

17 days after CX wrote about an incurable drone in an Oldsmobile Bravada SUV, General Motors agreed to buy it back for its full $31,600 cost.