When the customer doesn't matter

Yesterday was a crappy day. I had to take my car for a service and the closest centre I was allowed to use was in North London. So I set out at 7am and dropped the car off at 8.30, with the understanding that I would on my way before 11am.

So I found a Starbucks and caught up on some work reading before heading back at 11 only to find that the owners of the car (it's a lease hire car) had been arguing with the garage about what can and cant be done to the car and it hadn't been touched. It was meant to be a 48,000 mile service... simple!

This went on for a few hours, including the garage insisting that I needed new brake pads and the lease hire company not sure whether they wanted to pay for them.

I spent time looking in the local shops, then checking out the computers and home cinema setups in Comet, reading newspaper and eventually I left the garage at 4pm having read all the documents I had bought with me at least twice and written up my end of year report (the only good thing to come from the day). A complete waste of time.

This shows poor customer service in action, not necessarily from the garage - though they could have been a bit more helpful, but more from the lease hire firm who took around an hour to make a decision each time they were asked a question! And there's nothing I can do about it.

Bad mood now.