On 7/9/07, Jason <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> To go back to Craig's restaurant analogy from last week:  If several
> restaurant customers complain repeatedly about something is it better to
> kick the customers out or figure out if their complaint is legit and fix
> it?

Sprint has, what, 50 million customers (I looked it up...it's about
that)? 1000 of that is 0.002%.  Going back to my restaurant analogy
(since you seem to enjoy it so much), I'd have to have 150,000 regular
patrons in order for just 3 (the minimum number to qualify for
"several") to repeatedly complain about something.  So, yes, I don't
have a problem losing 3 undesirable customers if it helps me improve
my service level to the other 149,997, and I'm certainly not going to
spend resources improving my cash register speed or pie portion size
to satisfy this tiny minority of complainers.

> Maybe it does make sense to drop these 1000 customers

My _guess_ is that these customers are calling primarily about billing
issues (i.e., requests for extensions, excuses for not paying, wanting
to get charges removed, etc.), not technical issues that Sprint can
actually fix.  It's unlikely that anyone here on this mailing list
acts the way that Sprint's _worst_ customers act, and perhaps can't
even imagine someone behaving so antisocially/irresponsibly (I
know...my research involves customer service and I've spent a fair bit
of time inside call centers), so even though we don't know the
specifics of who is being cancelled and why, I have little problem
believing they were as much to blame as Sprint, if not more so.

> but without more
> information we don't know if the bad PR is worth it.  Apparently Sprint's
> management thinks so, but considering my past experience with Sprint I
> would bet they could have handled this better.

I'm sure you're right.  But then Sprint doesn't do a whole lot right
when it comes to customer service.

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