If you're a big multinational company and you have a feedback/contact form on your website, it makes sense that the form will work and will send messages to helpful people. Customer service, right? Shouldn't be that difficult, especially with simple enquiries.
I recently bought a new TV from LG, which connects to my router via ethernet. I wanted to go wireless, though, so wanted to know if LG's dongle, the AN-WF100, would work with my particular telly. Stay awake at the back.
So I sent a message via their contact site. I previewed it before sending and all looked OK. Then I got a reply.
Dear Customer [note the personal approach]
Thank you for your email.
Unfortunately your email did not contain anything if you require any assistance please do not hesitate to contact us on the details below.
There then followed a link to a second contact form, so I filled in all the details and rewrote my query. This time I copied it in case I had to send it a third time.
Once again, I got an automated response saying my second message was blank. Strange, because it definitely wasn't when I sent it. Then I noticed a customer survey at the bottom of the email, and after clicking "Very dissatisfied" I was taken to a page to explain why I didn't like having my time wasted by a system that didn't work.
So I wrote out my query a third time. This time was more successful: I got a one-word response. Hurrah! But there was no apology for their system being rubbish, no attempt to explain why the earlier messages hadn't gone through, and seemingly no desire to write a full sentence. Pretty poor really.
Dear Joe,
Thank you for your email.
Yes
We hope this helps and should you require any further help, please do not hesitate to contact us further.
Best regards,
LG Electronics UK Helpdesk
----------------------------------
LG Customer Services
UK: 0844 847 5454 Ireland: 0818 27 6954
Mon-Fri 9am to 8pm Sat 9am-6pm----------------------------------
Received Date : 30/03/2011 14:10 37
The type of inquiry : Parts or Accessories
Product/Model No. : LCD TV ( 33" Under )/32LE5900[GCE110330004339]
Hi. I've just bought an LG 32LE5900 TV, which I'd like to connect wirelessly to my internet connection.Could you please tell me if the AN-WF100 dongle is compatible with this model of television? There's no mention of different TV models on http://www.lg.com/uk/tv-audio-video/tv-accessories/LG-AN-WF100.jsp, and other sites (eg http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/an-wf100-usb-wi-fi-adapter-for-lg-tv-08473298-pdt.html?srcid=37&xtor=AL-12) suggest the 5900 series isn't compatible.
Can you help?
Incidentally, earlier today I sent a message about the same issue via via http://www.lg.com/uk/support/contact/support-message.jsp, and got a reply saying "Unfortunately, it seems that the email you have sent has no content attached. Please do not hesitate to contact us back with your query so that we can assist you further." You might want to check that the email form on that page works properly, as my message was shown in the preview before I submitted it.
Thanks,
Joe
In fairness to LG, they were prompt at replying, even if the rest of the service was absolutely crap.