Telefonica, the owners of Movistar claim that their [404 Check: was link to http:/ / www. telefonica. es/ rc2006/ telefonica/ informe_ rc/ pagee999. html?context=2719653&instanceid=2719654&lang=en, anchor: "goal is to convert our customers into Telefónica 'fans'."] I find that statement and their entire website about "customer service" to be offensive.The first principle of doing business is to get money from your clients. The second is to serve them well. The process of getting money from your clients should be done in such a way that you are serving them well in the process.
If you don't get money from your customers, you cannot serve your customers or your shareholders well.
Today, I decided I wanted to add some money to my prepaid Movistar cell phone in Uruguay. I walked into a payment office on the corner of Av Brasil and 26 de Marzo in Montevideo.
The way I like to add money to my phone account is give the clerk my phone number and some money. Before I am out the door, I'll have a message on my phone that the transaction is complete. It sure beats the heck out of trying to scratch the silver off a phone card and hoping I don't scratch the entire number off!
Not to mention the tremendous ecological resources wasted on an unnecessary plastic card, printing, transporation, etc, and my frustration of keying the number in properly. It is also a great disservice to the shareholders of Movistar/Telefonica, as I was given the option of buying a card for 150 or 250 pesos. Had I just forked over the cash and had it done automatically, I would have spent 500 or 1,000 pesos! Sorry shareholders.
OK, back to the problem today. When I entered the payment office, I started to write my phone number on a slip of paper and the clerk asked what I needed. I said I wanted to pay on my Movistar phone. She said, sorry, we only have cards today.
I asked how long and she said the automatic system had been non functional for 3 days... I think the last time I tried to use it was a couple months ago and I had to wait all weekend to add money to my account.
This will also be emailed / faxed to the investors relations, press office and CEO of Telefonica for their comment. I suppose like the recent problem my wife had with Movistar in Colombia where she could add money to her phone their card or not, it isn't likey I'll get any comment on this either.
Hopefully, some important shareholders of Telefonica and/or Movistar will run across this post and light a fire where the sun doesn't shine with the executives of the company to stop talking about Customer Service and start doing something!
When Movistar talks about wanting their customers to be fans, they need to seriously rethink their policy of "locking phones" which would be better equated with slavery than fans... and that is the topic of my next post.
