Rocket Science

Well, it seems Office Depot figured out how to deliver to my home address.

Source: Consumerist

Used Under User Agreement

Office Depot Delivers

Office Depot: Did you get the samples I sent yesterday? Let me know when you have a chance. Thanks!

Me: Yep, they arrived yesterday. Just wondering, what did you need to do to get them delivered?

Office Depot: To be quite honest, I have no idea. I basically just emailed my transportation department your order number and address info and told them not mess up this time around. So I’m not sure, but at least you got everything!

Me: What would be helpful, would be how to make sure if I place an order in the future, you (or someone else) doesn’t need to get involved to get the delivery. I’m not sure if that’s setting up a specific notes in a delivery location (I seem to recall that Office Depot has some word/phrase for these in BSD).

Office Depot: We should be good to go from now on. If there is any issues, please reach out to me directly instead of our customer service team.

(I’ve documented my previous experiences with Office Depot Fail.)

So I’ve been in communication with the local Office Depot reps for MIT.

Here’s a snippet of an email conversation:

Photo Credit: Brandon

Fail

I cannot apologize enough for this whole mess. I never found out the exact reason why the driver could not locate your ship to and there are no excuse that are [acceptable] for why he didn’t [call] or reach out for extra help. I want you to know that I think your [email] helped the situation, because it makes my transportation department reprimand our drivers a little more. So thank you for taking the time to respond. Because if our drivers are not performing to Office Depot standards, I think its important for our transportation department to be aware. And when this information comes straight from a customer, instead of an employee, I think the message comes off a little stronger.

–Name Withheld

Um, isn’t it a problem that, as an internal Office Depot staffer, the person I was working with said, “I never found out the exact reason why the driver could not locate your ship to [address]…”

I’m just saying.

Ok, I’m pronouncing it official. Office Depot fails.

So, of course, I didn’t receive a phone call back on Friday after speaking with Kim at National Accounts who said she’d, “Get to the bottom of my problem.” Mind you, I did specifically ask her to call back whether or not she made any progress and she agreed to do so.

I called Office Depot this morning to learn that a credit had been issued to my account and that I’d have to re-order the item. I responded, “Why the hell would I do that since you don’t seem to be able to deliver the product to me?” About two minutes after getting of the phone, I got a call from probably a dispatcher at Office Depot who was surprised that my order was “canceled”, she was calling to arrange for a delivery. She was also surprised that a credit had been issued. She said that yes two delivery attempts had been made and that usually throws something akin to an exception.

Hrm. Well, I think three delivery attempts were made, and the customer service person at the national accounts phone number that I called should have been able to see that. You see, they’re using computers, computers are good at transmitting information. Office Depot staff are bad at interpreting information.

To be completely fair, Office Depot clearly has some problems integrating their website, regular customer service staff, national accounts staff and so on. And they clearly have communication issues. But probably the real culprit here is probably the third-party delivery service it sounds like are the Office Depot hired to delivery the product to me delivery drivers. The drivers appear to by lying to Office Depot (based on the notes that Office Depot has read/paraphrased over the phone). I’ve never received a phone call from a driver, and certainly no driver left a message. Hello. Not Rocket Science. Having problems? Contact the customer. Customer not there? Leave a message. Or call dispatch and have them follow up. Don’t lie. Sheesh.

So the operative question is, why would I order from Office Depot again, even if I get a discount? Good question. I’m sorely tempted to order a single pen and have them go through this rigamarole till they get it right.

Is anyone surprised?

I did receive a call at 9:51am from Office Depot saying the package was out for delivery. Ok, great. But when I get home, no package. And by the way I was home until 1pm today.

I just got off the phone with Kim who said she’d call the driver and find out what was going on.

When I called, she said her system showed that the driver had called and left a message. According to my phone it’s possible that the driver called, but s/he definitely didn’t leave a message. I did received a call at 3:45pm, but there is no voicemail message associated with that number/time. Why are they lying?

Fail Office Depot fail.

So, for today’s rant, it’s about Office Depot Delivery drivers.

MIT is fairly progressive in that it’s negotiated with a number of national businesses to extend MIT-pricing for its staff and faculty. One of those businesses is Office Depot.

I placed an order for a toner cartridge on September 4, with expected delivery on September 9. Ok, that’s a long time, but the Labor Day Holiday is in between. And they must know they’re not capable of pulling the items for delivery the day after a holiday. Ok, whatever.

So, it’s now Thursday evening, September 10. Guess what, no package.

After 15 minutes on the phone with Office Depot, and after speaking with the national accounts representative (which is at a phone number that is not on the email confirmation that I received*), we may have provided sufficient information for the delivery. I’m the first to admit my mailing address is a bit odd, but you know–the USPS, FedEx and UPS all know how to deliver to this address. And if the driver was having problems, ok–for the love of pete, call. There’s a phone number on file. The same phone I used to call customer service.

I got some indication from the national accounts representative that they attempted to call. Bullsh*t. I know I never picked up my phone and answered a call from Office Depot. And I know that I didn’t receive any voicemail messages from Office Depot. To be fair, there was a call at approximately 6:12am on Thursday morning and a dead air message. That could have been them. Ok, uh, leave a message? I’m not psychic. Or better yet, call back later in the day. Really.

We’ll see what happens. I have a feeling that I’ll just end up ordering the toner from Amazon and posting that yes, Office Depot delivery drivers are incompetent.

For a similar story, check out the Consumerist on Office Depot Executive E-Mail Carpet Bomb Scores Direct Hit (though for some reason it’s not displaying properly in Firefox 3.5.3).

This is partially an experiment to see if Office Depot is web-aware and checking their reputation online.

* A completely separate rant is how bad the web experience with the Business Systems Division continues to be. I mean back when I was purchasing with them in 2002-2004 at UC Berkeley they didn’t get the web thing. Their order interface and experience was from the dumb terminal days. Today, let’s recognize computers are good at matching data. If I’m ordering from MIT, and you know I have a national account, then put the customer service number for national accounts and/or for me in particular in the email. Don’t make me call one number, wait on hold for 4-5 minutes and then tell me they have to transfer me. It’s called customer SERVICE for a reason. Ok, end rant.