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The WRONG Way to Sell a $600 Phone
Posted June 15, 2006 – 9:42 pm by Yakov Shafranovich in Personal, TechnologyYesterday my company ordered several of the newly released Treo 700p smart phones for myself and two other people in the company. The list price for these is $649 per phone (before any discounts).
The Bottom Line is that if you are selling something that expensive, then you better make sure that you communicate well with your customers. In this case, Palm’s online order tracking system is absolutely useless, their representatives were rude and their processing of orders is atrocious. Of course, this is much better than two years ago when I ordered my Treo 600 from Handspring only to find a wide gaping hole in their ordering system which lets me look at other people’s orders (I called them and it was promptly fixed).
For the gory details, see below the fold.
Day 1:
8:45 AM - Phone #1 ordered
11:30 AM - Phone #2 ordered (mine!)
1:08 PM - Phone #3 ordered
6 PM - Phone #1 is marked as shipped, phone #2 has not changed and phone #3 has been marked as processed. No tracking number on phone #1.
9 PM - I call the bank to make sure that everything is ok, and that these orders didn’t trigger any sort of security alert.
Day 2:
9:15 AM - I get a phone call from Palm asking me why two of the phones were ordered on the same credit card (corporate card). After verifying the information, the order for phone #2 is reprocessed.
9:17 AM - I get an email that the credit card for phone #2 (which is the same as #1) was declined. A VERY rude person from the “order review department” tells me that I have to call my bank.
9:25 AM - My bank tells me that Palm couldn’t match my cell # to the number on the account. Note that phone #1 with the same credit card number and wrong phone number went through.
9:30 AM - Call to Palm to redo the transaction, order in processing although still marked as “received”
11:00 AM - Phone #3 arrives
5 PM - Phone # 1 arrives
7:30 PM - Another Palm person tells me that they cannot let me know when the phone ships since “it is hard for them to predict the future”. VERY. RUDE. Oh and btw, about that tracking number? It never shows up on the website for phone #1 and phone #3, but is available by phone. Nice of them to let me know.
9:30 PM - Phone # 2 finally gets a shipping notification. Still no tracking number and the order is still marked as “received”.
10:10 PM - A very nice man with an English-accent gives me a tracking number which is not yet valid in the UPS system. Considering that the other two phones were shipped out of Kentucky at 5 PM, this does not bode well for getting it tomorrow.
7:30 AM - A quick look into UPS tracking shows that the package has arrived in Maryland. Woo hoo! BUT, the projected delivery date is set to Monday!!!
7:45 AM - A talk with a very nice UPS person leads to a conclusion that this package may or may not be delivered today. However, once it arrives to the proper processing center, I can actually drive over and pick it up. So for now, I am still waiting…
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