By Jolayne Houtz
THE SEATTLE TIMES
December 25, 2006
Got a question about your credit? Good luck reaching someone at Experian, a national credit bureau. It won’t even give you its phone number until you order a copy of your credit report.
Having trouble with your Eureka vacuum? Don’t press 0 – the manufacturer hangs up on you if you try to dodge its automated phone system.

Need information from Chrysler? Choose from one of five menu options on the car company’s phone system – or be trapped in an endlessly repeated loop from which there’s no escape.

Experian, Eureka and Chrysler are among the companies receiving an F grade for their telephone customer service from Gethuman.com, a consumer-advocacy organization. Gethuman has released a new report card rating 500 large American companies on how they serve consumers over the phone. Those three businesses were in good company: Nearly 85 percent of the companies flunked Gethuman’s evaluation.

Nine companies out of 500 earned A’s: Hertz Rent A Car, Commerce Bank, Dillard’s department store, retailers Lands’ End and L.L. Bean, Comfort Inn, Days Inn, Hyatt Corp. and Walt Disney World. “We were disappointed that the companies did as badly as they did,” said Lorna Rankin, Gethuman’s project director.

Many of the country’s most prominent companies – Wal-Mart, Visa, Washington Mutual, Apple, Toys “R” Us among them – are failing their customers on the phone, according to Gethuman. Entire industries flunked Gethuman’s audit, including all TV and satellite companies as well as most insurance, shipping, software and hardware companies. The group, launched by Internet entrepreneur Paul M. English, hopes to empower consumers to do business with customer-friendly companies.

Rankin also hopes that naming names will goad companies to do better by their customers. “If we see companies over time raising their grade, I would view that as a very positive thing,” she said. Each month, three teams of Gethuman volunteers will audit each company’s phone system and rank companies based on how they measure up against 10 standards voted on by visitors to Gethuman’s Web site.

“It’s not just whether you can get to a person, but what happens to you along the way,” Rankin said. Can you ask for a call-back rather than wait? Do you get an estimated wait time? Can you understand the agent when one finally comes on the line? Among the sins companies must avoid to get a good grade: No hiding the zero: Callers should be able to dial 0 or say “operator” for a human.

No repeats: Callers should never have to repeat information already provided to a human or an automated system during a call.
No happy talk: Companies should avoid patronizing, overly cheery computer voices and cliche phrases such as “Your call is important to us.”

At least one F-rated company said it already is working on improvements to its phone system. Electrolux Home Care Products, manufacturer of Eureka vacuums, was reviewing its automated phone system before Gethuman’s rankings were published. At retailer L.L. Bean, the phone hadn’t even started ringing on our end when an agent answered the call. “Providing a human option is critical to our business model,” spokesman Rich Donaldson said.

Customer service representatives employed by L.L. Bean answer calls at four centers in Maine. It is costly to do business that way rather than hiring contractors or relying on automation, but Donaldson said the company views it as a long-term investment. Doing away with the human touch “is something we wouldn’t consider,” he said.

Experian, the credit bureau that won’t even reveal its phone number unless you order your credit report first? We don’t know what it has to say about customer service. No one called us back.

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