Sometimes, it pays to complain...

I just returned from vacation and began looking through my held mail. I was surprised to find a $25.00 coupon from Thrifty Auto. I emailed them back in November to complain about the 1 hour wait time I had in Las Vegas on 11/3/07. I could not believe that an airport as busy as Vegas, and with the new car rental building, that Thrifty would only have two agents working on a Saturday at noon. The line was nearly to the door. I did not pickup the car until 1:15. I was livid. Some customers left the line to book with other companies. I stayed with Thrifty since my quoted rate was the best.

I am thankful that Thrifty listened to my complaint and addressed it by sending me the coupon which can be use until the end of 2008.

I have become a letter writer over the past five years, no matter what industry. If I have a beef with a company, I write to them about it.

I wrote a letter to Village Inn Pancake House a few years ago because we had lousy service and saw some employees in the kitchen goofing off, throwing food around. My letter was very welcomed and we got a personal call from the regional manager, plus lots of certificates for free food. I also wrote to Good Times, which is a small hamburger joint that has become a chain, and they were very receptive to some suggestions I made and sent me some free food coupons.

I went into letter writing bigtime six months ago, when I wrote to many different companies to ask for decaffeinated diet soda to be added to their drink selections. I sent out about 200 letters. I hope to get some good news from some of them, but most of them have just sent me free coupons for appetizers and told me there is no demand for decaffeinated diet soda, that I am in the minority. I know that is not true, as I have talked to many women who will only drink water at restaurants because of the caffeine issue.

Anyway, I am always on some crazy tangent. I am boring some people to sleep here.

I think letter writing is a good idea. You can really affect change with a letter. Plus, you can get free stuff! That was never my intent with the 200 letters, but I received at least $1,000 in free food and appetizers for my effort. I lost count within a few weeks. My mail box was flooded with mail about five days after my first letter went out. Is anyone carrying decaffeinated soda? Not more than two of them. But at least they know why I wrote the letters.

I have seen caffeine free diet pepsi at Baja Fresh here in CA. My mother really likes it. Since it's caffeine free, I usually will have it. Only place I've ever seen diet decaffeinated soda. I think it's a great idea. A lot of people don't want the caffeine, particularly at night!

A & W (diet rootbeer), Fuddrucker's and Culver's Butter Burgers are the only restaurants that carry anything diet and caffeine-free here. It is an option at Pepsi and Coke, so I don't understand why restaurants don't wake up and offer it.

I won't drink soda in restaurants at all at night, neither will Rick or my step-dad. We cannot be the only ones that cannot take the caffeine? If all restaurants offered it, we would buy it. Their loss.

Cindy,
This is why I always order water. Once you get used to it with your meals you won't go back to soda. :-(

Phil

Cindy: I'm with you on the letter writing. Before I retired as a public school administrator in 2005, my staff used to call me the Memo Queen. Yes, I wrote for a living. Once I get started on something, there's no stopping me. More people need to complain when they are dissatisfied.
Thanks for the reply.

I always drink water with meals and have for many years. Even though I love coffee, I drink it after my meal, not with it.

Are you sure that diet A & W Root Beer is caffeine free? I've never seen any with that description and every root beer I've ever seen has caffeine.

The best results I ever got from writing a letter was to Hilton. I had pre-paid for a room on the Executive Level, and only after we checked in did we find out that the lounge on that level was being refurbished and was closed. We were told we could get free appetizers in the bar (no thanks our kids were with us) and we did get a breakfast voucher for the morning. But, I was upset as I'd paid more, and even worse we weren't informed upon check in. So, when we checked out I asked what could be done. Since I'd pre-paid (on the Hilton website) I was told nothing. Heck, at that point if they'd comped the valet parking I would have been happy. So, I wrote a letter and sent copies to the hotel and to their corporate management. All I asked for was a credit for the difference in what I paid, and what we got (about $40). What I got back from Hilton was a free night at the hotel, on the Executive Level. When we went back to redeem our free night, not only was the lounge back in full working order, but the room we got was much nicer, better view. I wrote another letter to the hotel (copy to corporate) thanking them and letting them know they had retained a happy Hilton Honors customer.

Fern Modena said:

Are you sure that diet A & W Root Beer is caffeine free? I've never seen any with that description and every root beer I've ever seen has caffeine.

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Fern, FYI: The canned soda brand "Mug" root beer is caffeine free. It's a Pepsi product. "Barq's" rootbeer, a Coke product, does have caffeine. If your fast food restaurant has Pepsi products, and Mug rootbeer, that's a good choice if you don't want caffeine. If they sell Coke products, and offer Barq's, well, now you know the answer.

Dave

philemer said:

Cindy,
This is why I always order water. Once you get used to it with your meals you won't go back to soda. :-(

Phil

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That is what we drink. But I miss diet pop with my meals, especially Mexican food, pizza and burgers! I won't order diet pop with caffeine, and I tell every server why I won't order sodas or iced tea.

You know, the servers get bonuses when their soda, alcohol, appetizer, and "sides" sales are up. They make a mental note of your request for soda that is caffeine free and will take it back to management.

I just think restaurants will eventually offer the option, and I believe they will see a huge increase in beverage sales as a result. How many people go into a restaurant at night, even an IHOP or Village Inn, and order coffee with caffeine? Most order decaf because they want to sleep! :zzz: Remember when instant Sanka was the only decaf around?

Another ten years or so...........

Hajjah, I am so glad I am not the only letter writer. I complained via letter to Alamo Car Rentals once because they gave me a car that was too small for my grandmother's wheelchair, and they gave me a free 3-day rental coupon. I didn't even have to pay tax. I used it for a weekend trip to a wedding in Austin.

Letter writing is a dying art. You can accomplish a lot with a letter.

Years ago I was on a business trip to London. My last night I stayed at one of the 2 Sheratons near Heathrow. I normally stayed at one of Sheratons, but on this trip I had to stay at the other one. I was a gold member and I requested an upgraded room. I was told that I had an upgrade. My co-worker was also given a supposed upgraded room and we were very disappointed in the rooms we were assigned to. We went back to the desk and complained. No, they said, you have an upgrade. Later, another co-worker checked in and he got a real upgraded room. He invited me to look at it and it was far different from what I was assigned. We complained again the next morning and were told "too bad".

Corporate Sheraton sent me a questionnaire asking me what I thought about my stay. I told them exactly what I thought. I received a letter from the Sheraton in London in response saying, basically, better luck next time. After my next stay in another Sheraton, I received a follow up questionnaire. I complimented the Sheraton for that stay but mentioned my unacceptable response from that London manager. I later received a letter of apology from that manager and an offer for a free stay at his hotel when I visited London again. I was supposed to use that letter to get my free room. Unfortunately, I didn't return to London for over a decade so I didn't make use of it.

It would have been better for Sheraton do offer me something that I could use, but I was glad that they did make that manager accountable.

Sue

rickandcindy23 said:

You know, the servers get bonuses when their soda, alcohol, appetizer, and "sides" sales are up. They make a mental note of your request for soda that is caffeine free and will take it back to management.

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WHAT? I know a lot of "servers" and none has ever mentioned a bonus on soda sales. Do you have some empirical evidence for us?

Phil

Why yes I do. :rofl:

Our daughter was a server at Lone Star Steakhouse for years, and our son also worked for a local Mexican food restaurant nearby. Both were given bonuses (commissions?) for selling sides, beverages, appetizers over a certain level. The bonuses were small, and sometimes they were in the form of gift certificates for the restaurant, but they did get them. Our daughter was a super salesperson and always received a bonus, every month.

Some servers lose their jobs for not selling beverages and appetizers, which is a down side of the restaurant business.

Our foster son still works at Pappadeaux and they also reward servers for "sales," as did Bennigans and Cinzzetti's.

rickandcindy23 said:

A & W (diet rootbeer), Fuddrucker's and Culver's Butter Burgers are the only restaurants that carry anything diet and caffeine-free here. It is an option at Pepsi and Coke, so I don't understand why restaurants don't wake up and offer it.

I won't drink soda in restaurants at all at night, neither will Rick or my step-dad. We cannot be the only ones that cannot take the caffeine? If all restaurants offered it, we would buy it. Their loss.

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I always ask too! I like your letter writing campaign and may do it locally...I frequently have wondered why they just don't have it.
Connie

Good side bad side

I too will write a letter of complaint when I have felt mis treated. In the same regards though if I have had something special happen or treated extra well I also write. My biggest problem is I forget to get names at the time.
I do get the names when I'm mad but not when I want to compliment someone. I am trying to get better at that.
Bart

I have written many letters both pro and con and always gotten at least a reply. My favorite tactic is to write the CEO personally with a return receipt required. That way at least his/her personal assistant gets the letter instead of relegating it to the "bed bug file".

Latest one was a Royal Caribbean cruise tour complaint about it not being as advertised. After a couple of phone replies, we got two complete refunds. This one only went to the Service Department but I would have backed it up with a CEO missive if they had not come through.

Cheers

I too received the Starwood questionnaire after a stay at their Vistana Beach club in Jensen Beach, florida. My sis is paralyzed and for the entire week we saw contruction going on at the resort and huge pallets of supplies piled into all the handicapped spots. I complained to the sales people when they asked me for the tour, to the front desk who said the manager would call me (and he did not) The manager totally hid from us even after I went looking for him- when I found him he blamed the contsruction manager- what an upstanding guy. Well, someone finally cleared ONE spot of the junk. It was so totally unacceptabe and illegal. I blasted the resort and the manager and let Sheraton know how their people treated handicapaped patrons. They did send me a nice response and 10,000 star points. I hope they fired the worm.
PS- I did get my say on tripadvisor.com and it felt good.

For one of my classes when I was in school we had to write one letter of praise and one letter of complaint to companies we had recently dealt with. Of 15 people in the class, 13 got responses to their complaints. The two of us who didn't get a response (I was one of those two) had written to Comcast. Can't say I was surprised.

Pays to Complain

djs said:

For one of my classes when I was in school we had to write one letter of praise and one letter of complaint to companies we had recently dealt with.

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I think it is important to bring poor service, poor product quality or the terrible, third world provided, customer "no service" to the attention of management. I did this as a lark once when I was 12. I had a box of Good & Plenty and complained they discriminated against whites since there were only two white candies and the rest were pink. They sent a case of it to me and a thank you for bringing it to their attention.

Many years ago when I was in college, I was working as a waitress and ran in to a Nordstrom still wearing my uniform. Both sales girls in the department ignored me till I brought my selections from the clearance rack up to the counter.

The first girl looked at the tags, looked at me and without a word and walked away and got the second girl who came and told me they could not sell me those clothes at that price. When asked why, she replied that THEY had not marked them down to that price. I asked her if she was accusing me of marking them down and she said "Well, we didn't".

I was so shocked and being so young, I just turned around and left.

I got madder and madder at being accused basicly of theft and ended up calling corporate in Seattle. Surprisingly I got right through to someone "big", and in a very short time I had a very contrite sales girl from the store phoning me and asking me if she could personally deliver my purchases to me at the price they were marked at. I very sweetly told her she could, getting great pleasure at making her drive about 50 miles round trip.

IT PAYS TO COMPLAIN!

Gayle

I have gotten mad all over again just thinking of that incident. Let it go, let it go....................

Years ago I worked with a guy named Ron who showed me a cigarette he'd found with a filter at each end. It was in a regular pack, and was an obvious manufacturing goof. I told him he should just keep the cigarette as a novelty. Sort of like a two-headed snake.

He said he was going to send it back to the tobacco company. He told me he'd done that on a previous occasion when he'd come across the same thing. He told me the first time around the company replied with a nice letter, and they sent him two cartons of cigarettes in apology.

In retrospect, knowing what I do now about cancer and such, it doesn't seem like such a great thing. But at the time, it was pretty neat.

Dave

just my two cents

Reading all the stories brought mine back to me... one good one.. a stay at Disneyworld in Orlando.. had friends from England visiting and my mom accompanied us.. along the way, she took down names of extra helpful staff. Upon her return home, she commented on how helpful people were and wrote a nice letter. She got a phone call from DIsney about her letter !! The bad experience was at the Dorado Beach hotel. Marriot or Hilton I don't recall but I had a bird fly onto my breakfast and take off with part of it... got the wrong room assigned, no balcony and after moving 3 times... no airconditioner that worked... water all over the floor in 2 rooms.. after a letter with pictures of this disgrace, we were awarded a 3 day stay at the hotel for the future.. I hoped it could be elsewhere but it was that one.. also the river pool was polluted or something wrong with it... it was not a good trip.. we never went back.. felt better tho, being heard... I always try to take the time to answer a survey and give pos or neg feedback...

I have written many letters over time and have been very happy with the responses that I have received from companies.

The one exception was an experience with the Sheraton Fallsview Hotel in Niagara Falls Canada (at least 10 yrs ago). We were staying there with a group of other families - all of us had children at school together. One of the mothers had arranged for a group discount and we had been doing this for the third straight year.

We started to be aware of a problem when some of our group had some comments about our group directed at them from the staff. Finally at check out, my good friend's husband was called into the manager's office and told that our group was not welcome to come back. The manager made an offhand comment about "you people" indicating that our ethnic background was coming into play. Some of the accusations that were levelled at us were wrongly attibuted to our group. I was very shocked and wrote a long letter to the Sheraton organization but received nothing in return. I concluded that the Sheraton was not a company that cared about customers.

The following year we went to the Hilton and were treated extremely well by the manager and the staff.

CSB said:

The following year we went to the Hilton and were treated extremely well by the manager and the staff.

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Cindy, what an outrage. What exactly was it "you people" were supposed to have done?

Dave

Let's see if I can remember - I believe one was that we heaped our plates at the buffet and kept going up for more and then leaving lots of food without eating it. We were confused with another group because our seating arrangements were changed.

We were also accused of letting the children play in the stairwell and having them drop things down to the bottom. I do not know if anyone in our group had any child that misbehaved like this but there were just too many things said that we knew to be untrue.

When I arrived at the swimming pool, my friend told me that she had just asked for a life jacket for her child. The pool attendant said that there were no life jackets. A few minutes later, another guest asked for a life jacket and that same attendant opened a cupboard and gave her one.

Just a sampling....