A colleague and I like to trade customer service stories. He loves Plated and recommended them to me. So far, I haven’t had any issues with them that required resolution, but my friend has. Little things, like once they forgot a minor ingredient, so they credited him a few dollars to cover the cost. Or, recently, his box was delivered to the wrong house. It took a few extra hours and some confusion before the error was revealed, and in the end, all was well, but Plated took the extra step of crediting my friend the cost of the box. He did not expect this, nor did he request it, but Plated’s response was, “You were inconvenienced. That is not okay. This box is on us.”

In return, my friend tells others about this, and then they want to use Plated, too. It’s a win all the way around. Plated empowered it’s customer service representatives to consider how customers might feel in a given situation, and made an adjustment. Plated gets it right.

Recently, I experienced the opposite of Plated’s customer service, from Amazon.

I reached out to Amazon because a book I had ordered was not delivered on time. Did I need the book that exact second? No. But I didn’t like the pattern of delivery issues I have been having with Amazon, and this book coming late did not help.

In the last year, I have had four items either not delivered per their “guaranteed” delivery date, or not delivered at all.

When I did reach out to Amazon to address these issues, I struggled to reach resolution. I filed an electronic complaint, and was rewarded with five – count them, five – robo-calls from Amazon’s customer service department. It was the weirdest thing; I would answer my phone only to hear a recorded message saying, “Thank you for calling Amazon’s Kindle services…a customer representative will be with you shortly…your estimated wait time is…”

Seriously? First, I didn’t reach out to Kindle services. Second, you called me, Amazon. Why on earth do you think it’s a good idea to ring someone’s phone only to force them into being on hold? Whose idea of customer service is that?

While I do think the company should refund items that never arrive (which they did), and I do think they should be held accountable for their so-called “guarantees” without customers chasing them down (after all, what does “guaranteed” delivery mean otherwise?), what will keep me a loyal customer of any business is some acknowledgement that the company actually values me as an individual. I want to shop with businesses that empower their staff to keep their word, stand behind their promises, and deliver as expected. And mistakes happen, own it. Stand behind the promises you make to your customers, and don’t make excuses. And for the love of all things sacred and holy, don’t make them chase you down (or sit on hold) to make it right.