Customer service in London is absolutely deplorable. Having been in customer services roles for most of my career, I know a little bit about this topic. Service is not hard. As my friend Rachel says (both about service and in life), “People either get it or they don’t. There’s no in-between.” As my story with the bank details, it often takes herculean efforts to get anything done either inside or outside of an existing process.
BTW, mind you, the bank account issue finally closed on Friday – almost a month after initially trying to open an account. However, I have been denied credit EVERYWHERE as I have no credit history in the UK. An American college student would have a better chance of opening a Visa card than me. The mobile phone company for a 10GBP monthly subscription said no to a yearlong contract for a mobile broadband SIM card, even though I could have prepaid for it with the cash in my pocket. Ludicrous, but I digress.
The stories of bad customer service abound here in this country. Even my manager at work had an issue over the weekend related to returning a faulty appliance to a discount store. In a nutshell, he went in without the receipt, but with his credit card statement and the reference number. The woman was outright rude to him and went so far as to quote the Sale of Goods Act of 1979 that dictates return policies here in the UK. He then drove to another location for this company ten miles away, and they did the return with no issue. If only it ended here. He drove back to the original location, queued up for the same woman, and proceeded to tell her how terrible her service was and that her lack of understanding of the companies processes and the law made him have to waste an extra hour of his day to get the right thing done. He asked to speak to the manager, and she said she was the customer service manager. REALLY?
After that, he said, “I want to speak to the store manager.” She told him that he wasn’t there, and that he would have to come back at another time. Then, another manager overheard the conversation and said, “I am the store manager.” My manager replied, “funny, she just told me that you weren’t even here.” He looked at the original woman and said, “Do you often lie directly to your customers, or is that just something you do when you’re wrong?” The store manager quietly pulled him aside to talk and my manager walked away with a discount for the next time that he shops in the store. The funny thing here is that this is often the norm, not the exception. So much so that it has become a topic in our team meetings.
The pleasant thing is that there is a definite exception to the rule here: John Lewis. John Lewis is a mid to high range department store with a food hall like most of the other major department stores here in London. For you Americans, imagine Nordstrom, with certain things that are the price of JcPenney. Affordable luxury with higher value on service for which a customer like me is willing to pay. They also own Waitrose, a higher end grocery store, with a larger specialty selection of groceries than your Tesco or Sainsburys. It’s similar to Whole Foods, in a sense, without the faux granola feel.
My John Lewis experience has been nothing but pleasant. Sellers in their shops who are knowledgable with no high pressure sales. People who say hello, are genuinely concerned with your experience as well as fulfilling your needs. I went to three different John Lewis stores to test out mattresses and ogle TV’s. In EVERY situation, I was greeted in each department and the person stayed with me to ensure that I had all of my questions answered. However, they left me alone enough to make my own decisions in a hands-on sort of manner. I told them that I was most likely going to place my order online, and they printed out the exact things at which I was looking for me to make a decision on my time. And, they price match, offer a longer warranty and deliver for free over a certain amount.
It does not stop there. Their customer service representatives on the phone for the delivery and order were genuine, friendly, genial and extremely thorough. I placed two separate orders and my flat mate placed one. Originally, we had three different delivery times. But, the person who called me this morning to confirm delivery noticed the three orders to the same place and made sure that the orders were going to come on the same truck a the same time.
The overall selection, service and experience has been top notch and I will continue to shop there and at Waitrose again and again.
American Expat in London 
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