I ask you this morning: What is reasonable to expect from employees these days regarding customer service?

With every employer in the U.S. seemingly looking for employees today, should I expect less regarding customer service? Should you?

I ask the question because, for the past three months, my dealings with businesses and their representatives seems to leave me frustrated and exhausted from ineptitude, carelessness, and rudeness.

Before I go any further, I should stress that none of those frustrations originated from a local business. My experiences with those businesses have been very good.

My frustrations stem mostly from telephone conversations with national or regional businesses. Having just completed a move, it was important that a change of address was made by me with all the businesses my family has a relationship with. From the cable company to the natural gas company, the health insurance providers to the financial institutions, one by one by one, they all needed to be contacted.

First off, let me share with you: Contacting that many companies is no small feat when you consider all the businesses you have relations with each month. If each contact went perfectly, that still would result in a lot of time spent on the phone.

But, if each one went perfectly, I would not be writing this column.

Truth is, except for one or two, all were disasters when it came to customer service.

First, each of those companies post a bulldog at their entry point in the form of an automated receptionist. No matter how pleasant I might be to that robot, I got nowhere in having her circumvent the system for me. (I say “she” since every company I dealt with posted a robot with a female voice at the gatekeeper’s station).

After patiently jumping through a dozen questions designed to shorten the call for you, the gatekeeper finally transfers your call to a “live” person. The problem is the wait time to talk to that “live” person was as little as 10 minutes to as long as 70 minutes (probably longer … at that point, I conceded defeat and hung up.)

Whatever happened to a friendly voice that simply asked, “How might I help you this morning?”

Instead, here is a summary of the kinds of frustrations and terrible customer service I experienced:

∫ With one company, I talked to three different representatives on three different days trying to change my address and establish a simple work order for service at my new address. The first two times, the work order contained numerous mistakes by two different people inputting the information from me.

∫ That same company had to send a service person five times to my new address to install basic service. Obviously, there was a problem four times that never was permanently resolved until the fifth service tech arrived.

∫ In total, I had to make about a dozen address changes. Of those 12, at the time of this writing, I have had to call back to six of those companies and make the address change again after mail was forwarded to my new address that originally contained the old address.

∫ In one of those call-backs, I couldn’t talk to a “live” operator that day. I had to make an appointment for the next day to receive a call back.

∫ One of the letters forwarded to my new address — but originally sent to the old address — contained a letter saying the company had made the new address change in their computer system. Why then, I ask, was the letter informing me of that sent to the old address?

I could go on, but I won’t.

I really have come to appreciate a simple smile and nice gesture from those involved in customer service.

I know this: Since that whole experience, if I deal with a pleasant customer service representative, my tips have become much more generous.

For instance, at Easter, my family had brunch at a restaurant where the food was excellent but the customer experience was outstanding. You better believe the wait staff knew my appreciation for their efforts.

How about you? What have you experienced lately? Dial 1 for positive thoughts, Dial 2 for negative thoughts. Don’t forget to leave the last four digits of your social, the date of your firstborn child’s birth, and the correct answer to Wordle today.

Here’s smiling at you this morning!

Bill Speer recently retired as the publisher and editor of The News. He can be reached at bspeer@thealpenanews.com.