It's always good to get that first call of the day when it's a client who is calling to say "yes. we are ready to do business."  But what about that dreaded call when a client that's not even your client calls screaming and hollering "I'm through with you people. I've had enough and I want to cancel right now."

By now you guessed it.  This morning my first call from a gentleman who asked for my by name and began to describe his situation.  He had mailed in a cancellation form and his membership hasn't been canceled.  All the while I was pondering "is this one of my clients?"  His name doesn't seem to ring a bell. As I continued to listen I realized he had the wrong person but I was wondering how he got my name.

The wonders of being popular on the Internet has its advantages but today I discovered one of the disadvantages.  The gentleman who wasn't my client Googled my company name and my name and there I was.  Not the person he was looking for obviously but non the less I was the guy who showed up online and he wasn't taking no for an answer.

As he continued to talk I calmly let him know that I thought he had the wrong person.  None of that seemed to register because all he was focused on was getting his membership canceled.  So I said to him, can you hold for a moment.  As I gathered my thoughts I came back to the phone and said let's do this.  Let's get the customer service on a three way phone call and we'll get it handled. 

What came next was pure magic.  When the customer service rep got on the line of course the first person didn't have authorization to handle this man's situation.  The customer service manager then gets on the phone to yet give the same answers as the customer service rep.  I knew this wouldn't end up good if this guy had to jump through one more hoop.

Here I am on the phone with a man who isn't my client and a customer service manager who isn't giving an inch and there is no record of a cancellation on file. What was I to do? Why am I involved with this deal anyway? There seemed to be a stale mate and the non-client who has now become my potential worse night mare is madder than a wet hen and the manager just didn't seem to have a clue about how to resolve the situation.  So here's what I did.  I interrupted the conversation and just asked "is there a record of Mr. Non-Client's email requesting to cancel?"  Mr. Non-Client said he had a copy and the manager said she had a copy.  Now we seemed to be getting somewhere. So very simply I said can we just get this resolved right now via email.  Mr. Non-Client and the manager finally agreed and the cancellation was handled by email and I was a witness to them both saying they received the appropriate emails.

The moral of the story is even when a client isn't your client, do what you can to help them.  If nothing else you'll feel better and leave a positive taste in their mouth in spite of a negative situation. It's OK for for a client to not be satisfied even when there are millions of people who love your products and/or services. We have to honor their decision. Mr. Non-Client in this case was extremely apologetic to me for getting me involved.  He did realize I was the wrong person but was extremely thankful that I took the time to help him.  Of course I asked him to give me a call personally if he ever decided to reinstate his membership.  His words were, "you are the only one I would call, you're a real credit to your company. Thanks so much Cedric.  You really didn't have to help me but you did"

It was worth it,

Ced Reynolds

Career Recruiter

I am always looking for people who are willing to go the extra mile.  If you know somebody like that send them my way.  I am building a team of champions who care for people.