A friend of mine is doing an extension on her home at the moment, and funnily enough, this involves renovating and replacing an old kitchen with a brand new kitchen.

And just this week my friend had to take delivery of the new oven and cooker that was going into the new kitchen space.

Now you’d expect that the retailer that sold my friend the cooker would be considerate when organising the delivery of the cooker so that the delivery “experience” matched the purchasing “experience” as well as the expectations of the customer.

And let me tell you this.

This was not some low priced stove that was being delivered.

This was a SERIOUS cooker she bought.

In fact, for the price that my friend paid for her cooker, anybody would expect that they were going to receive service personified with a capital “S”.

Sadly for my friend this was not the case.

So here’s what happened….

Firstly, when the delivery truck arrived, it did not have one of those fancy hydraulic up and down platforms on the back.

Secondly, there were not enough able bodied men inside this truck to be able to remove the cooker from the back of the truck and deliver it to the kitchen to be placed close by to where it needed to go [and be connected].

And so the delivery guys started swearing expletives to my friend about the “lack of assistance” that she, the buyer was providing.

Yes, you have read this correctly… when my friend told me this I was gobsmacked!

At the same time, the delivery guys were also swearing about having to carry the cooker up some wide timber steps, until my friend explained to the rude delivery guys that there was another wider and more accessible doorway [with no steps] that the cooker ACTUALLY needed to go through.

This extreme antisocial behaviour from these delivery guys was witnessed by some other well mannered delivery guys [from another retailer] who just happened to be COURTEOUSLY delivering some bathroom ware, as well as the cabinet maker who was installing the kitchen.

In the end the cooker was just “plonked down” in the hallway with some of its protective packaging being removed from the cooker, so that these unequipped delivery guys could actually get a hold on the cooker.

It was definitely not a “World Class” buying experience…

My friend was horrified.

She phoned the retailer to let them know of her disappointment, and to alert the retailer that delivery guys with this sort of arrogance were out there representing the retailer at the product delivery touchpoint…. and letting them down badly.

When my friend told the agent at the retailer how the delivery guys from the other company were so much more polite, the agent said:

“Oh they [the other company] are a much bigger company.”

Well, hello?

Does that mean that because the retailer who sold the cooker was a smaller company, that clients buying from them have to tolerate swearing, arrogance, and rudeness from their delivery people?

My friend is tempted to contact the cooker company directly to let them know that that the delivery experience from this purchase was not in keeping with the experience that this cooker company would be wanting its customers to have.

And as my friend said, she doesn’t want to think that that the horrid memory of these nasty delivery guys is going to come flooding back into her mind each and every time she uses that cooker. …

It certainly might take a while….

In your business…

In your business, are all the people and agents representing your brand, really representing your brand in the way that you would want them to be doing so?

Or are they sometimes taking the feelings of your clients and customers for granted?

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Dr. David Moffet BDS FPFA CSP is a certified CX Experience coach. David works with his wife Jayne Bandy to help SME businesses improve their Customer Service Systems to create memorable World Class experiences for their valued clients and customers. Click here to find out how David and Jayne can help your business