New Rules

I feel kind of sorry for Austin.

Not the city in Texas, but the guy who answers the phone at SuperPass, the RealRadio thing where you pay to get streaming content.

I thought I’d try it out because they offer a two-week trial where you pay nothing up front, and just cancel if you decide you don’t want it.  I knew I wouldn’t want it from the beginning – I just thought I’d check it out for fun.  So I put in my credit card number, which was required to activate the service, and I made a mental note to cancel before the two weeks were up.

I didn’t have any reservations about this, because it’s not exactly some shady website or fly-by-night scheme.. it’s RealRadio, and they’ve been around for years.

I actually decided to cancel four days into it.. this is because I’d spent about 20 minutes perusing their content and just decided that I have too many free alternatives to warrant it, and I didn’t have time for it anyway – so I clicked on the “click HERE to cancel” link..

To cancel Superpass, call our toll-free number and speak to a representative, Monday through Friday, between 9:00am and 6:00pm eastern time.

WHAT???  I have to CALL THEM? In this day and age, when you can “click here to cancel” and it actually does that on a website right away?  This was on a Saturday so I had to wait until MONDAY to call, and I had to coordinate California time with the east coast.  ARRRGH!

“Riiiiiiiinnng….  (click)….. Thank you for calling SuperPass, my name is Austin and I’ll be your representative, how may I help you today?”

“I-NEED-TO-CANCEL”

“I’m terribly sorry to hear that sir, may I ask why?”

I KNEW he would ask why.. I KNEW IT.  But had I known it was a “call to cancel” system, I never would have tried it out in the first place.  I told him this.  I also told him that people HATE this sort of thing, as proven by the sheer volume of complaints generated some years back when people tried to cancel their AOL accounts, only to have to wrangle with a rep on the phone for a half hour or more to get them to agree to it.

I told him it wasn’t right.  I told him it pissed me off, and that I’d only be keeping the basic RealRadio on my system because some files will only play on it, but I’d definitely never have anything to do with SuperPass again.  I told him I’d blog about my discontent.  I was nice, because I deal with too many ranting jerks in my own job to be one, but I had to let him know how I felt.

Austin was very polite and professional through the whole thing.  He was even a little bit sassy, but in a good way, as he apologized and said he’d pass it on to his manager.  He won’t, I know.. I just had to voice my displeasure and he knew it.  I doubt it was the first time that day he’d heard the same complaint.  We left on a very good note, because I refused to hang up until I’d received a confirmation of cancellation email.  I’m a little sassy myself, in a good way.

BUT THEN..

I got to thinking about it, and I decided they may have a point.  I mean, don’t marketing people go to school to learn these kind of things?  They get degrees in how to manipulate the public and increase sales.  Who am I to argue with someone who has a college degree?  So, I’ve decided to adopt this same tactic for use here at The RhodesTer Chronicles.

Of course, there’s NO WAY I’m putting my cell phone number out on the interwebz, and I can’t afford to hire a slick and sassy assistant like Austin, so I’m afraid I’ll just have to insist that you EMAIL ME if you should decide you no longer care to visit this blog.  I’ll be asking why and attempting to talk you out of it.  I’ll be nice of course, and slick.. and sassy..

This applies to you who get the feed subscription AND the email subscription too.  YOU MUST EMAIL ME BEFORE YOU UNSUBSCRIBE.  I’m also going to take it one step further and do something that the SuperPass people don’t do because they actually weren’t smart enough to think of it..

I’m going to insist that you replace yourself.

That’s right.. I AM NOT going to watch my subscriber count and daily views go down just because you’re dissatisfied or whatever it is that’s gotten stuck in your craw today, so what you will have to do is recruit another reader to take your place.  This is after you’ve emailed me and we’ve had a pleasant exchange but I was unable to talk you out of leaving.  You will need to recruit someone else to read The RhodesTer Chronicles at least several times a week so that my count doesn’t go down.

Now that we’re clear on the rules here, I’d like to thank you for trying The RhodesTer Chronicles, and wish you a pleasant day.  If we can be of further assistance, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

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Tagged as: customer service, real radio, realplayer