I’m sure many of you know that if you complain loud enough to customer service you can get some positive action done. I don’t understand company policies as I’m sure some of you don’t either because they like to keep us ignorant and if we are compliant and accepting then it’s better for them. I’ll give you a couple of examples because I’m sure you’re saying what in the world is she talking about.

The first example is about credit cards, last year Bill decided after 20 years of using the one credit card that he was tired of paying the annual fee and he wasn’t happy about the interest rate. He decided he was going to cancel this particular card so we called and they practically begged him not to. They said they would lower the interest rate and also remove the annual charge, well why didn’t they do that on their own?

If they had done that on their own even a year before Bill would have been ecstatic and would still be using their card and think that they were the best company in the world. Since he had already made up his mind the bribes now just weren’t good enough so he told them no thanks that he didn’t want it any more. So if you have cards you think are crap you might want to call and complain and see if they will do something to help you out.

The second example is our cable company. We recently had problems and the cable guy came out to fix our problems. He determined that it was the box so Bill took the old one back Saturday and upgraded it, after connecting we were suppose to call and have it affirmed. After calling and going through a sequence to make sure everything was loaded and working right, I asked the guy about different packages and he said he might be able to help us out.

I put Bill on the phone and Bill told him he wasn’t happy about the increase in pricing and wanted to know what could be done to lower it and if he could get just one HBO channel instead of 10 and all those music channels we never watch. We were very surprised when the guy lowered the whole package by 17 dollars and even took 17 dollars off of last months bill and we still have all those channels we don’t watch, but since it’s now cheaper Bill is happier about the whole deal.

This guy told Bill that if he had complained months ago they would have lowered it then. So why didn’t they just do it instead of waiting for a complaint? Because so long as we accept what is dished out without questioning then we get taken advantage of or at least that’s how I see it. Why should companies act in a human fashion and try to help those that support them and give them a savings especially when companies are folding left and right.

There are always hidden policies that we as consumers just don’t know about and never will unless we learn to complain more. I don’t mean complain to each other, I mean to complain to customer service or someone that has the authority to help. If you have a service that you aren’t pleased with go complain  directly to the business that you aren’t happy with and you might be pleasantly surprised by the results.

Just like eating out, if you get a bad meal don’t complain to the waitress go directly to management.