I’m a busy person who would like to spend money with you–treat me like that

When I finally decided that I would reduce/change my Blackberry plan so I could (better) afford the EVDO card I wanted to strike while the iron was hot and get it.

Stop one, mall.  Lesson: If you don’t have it, see if you can find it

Contrary to my what my gut told me, I went to my closest Telus reseller instead of the one I was at on Sunday.  This one is a basic mall store.  Nothing fancy.  I walked in, there were several people in the store and when I was looking at the card a person came right up to ask me if I needed help (ping! good!).  Unfortunately, the sales person wasn’t the most outgoing person and didn’t instill confidence in his sales ability (bzzt, bad).  I told him that I wanted the PCMCIA version of the EVDO card, he offered the USB version (in hindsight with the SD card reader conflict maybe should have gone for that).  I said, no, I want the PC Card one.  He check the stock and they didn’t have any.  That’s fine.  He said he could order one (good).  I said that I really wanted to get it now and today to use that night.  This was his chance to say: “Let me see if there is one another store…”, but he didn’t.  Bzzt. No sale, next store.

Stop two, another outlet on the way.  Lesson: When people come into your store, greet them

Okay, strike one.  I knew where I thought could get the card, the store where I saw it Sunday, but on the way there I saw another Telus outlet.  Okay let’s try this one.  I walk in, two people working in the store, both busy with customers.  That’s okay.  I look around a bit and then walk up to the counter.  I wait.  And wait.  No reaction from either human.  Okay, wander around some more.  Pause by other section of counter.  Nothing.  Wander.  Wait back at counter again.  It’s been well over five minutes now and nothing.  I start heading for the door and the customer says: “You should ask him a question, that’s what he’s there for.”  This is when one person lifted his head up and said “Can I help you?”  I said that I wanted to get something.  He replied that they were busy, could I come back.  I replied, “No, I have deadline I’m on”.  Bzzzt. No sale, next store.

Stop three, success. Lesson: greet, help, recommend. Sale.

Yes, I should have gone here first.  Of course if I did, then you wouldn’t get this post now would you?  I walked into the store, this is also a mall one and operated by Tom Harris Cellular (as I’ve said before), and the woman who wasn’t with a customer asked if she could help me within a minute of me walking up to the counter.  Same spiel, this is what I want.  We have USB.  I want PCMCIA. We could order it.  I wanted to use it tonight.  This is where the first place fell down, so … what happens next?  She says: “Let me check our other stores…” Wow.  Turns out there was one, just one, PCMCIA card in all of Victoria (the store in Sidney).  She asks if I’d like to set it all up there or drive to Sidney and do it.  I ask, if I do it here if she gets a commission, no. Oh … but we do get bonuses… Then I’ll do it here I say and tell her about the two previous experiences and how she did what, I think, is the right way to get business.  That alone would make a good story, but it gets better.

I know that I need to change the plan on my Blackberry so I can afford this deal.  I called Telus the day before to check out plans and such so I thought I knew what I wanted.  Turns out, I was wrong.  The woman, who was personable and outgoing, took the time to double check both my voice and data plans and found a data plan for the Berry with unlimited data but without modem tethering.  This, of course, is find since I’d have the EVDO card.  The voice plan was just what I thought, but she did give me good alternatives.  Perfect, all set.  Now, when it came time to switch things around one of my bundles wasn’t available.  Oh, buy when I called Telus they didn’t tell me that.  This could have been a stopper, but undaunted she called Telus directly and made sure that we could still do it.  And when I offered not to bother, she said, that it would be better too if I wanted voicemail.  Plan switched.  Done.

The EVDO card and plan was simple.  Just $100/mo for the unlimited North America plan (US and Canada only) and $49 for the card with a three contract.  By the time she was done, everything was ready and I just had to pick the card up in Sidney.

This is customer service.  She was pleasant and outgoing.  She checked to see if I could get the card today and made recommendations that got me more bang for my buck.

We have a winner.

Because I had this good experience I have no issue recommending them to you.  In fact, as I said in the other post, they have a “tell a friend” program.  You get $10 off, I get a $10 gift card, and they donate $10 to charity.  All you have to do is mention my name and cell number (I’d say from this card).  I was told that this unlimited data plan deal is only going to be around for another two weeks … so if you want one of these rockin’ cards and get this sweet data deal, I’d go now.

Yeah and getting the USB dongle will get you the device faster I guess too.

Post from: EveryJoe

Buying a Telus EVDO card–lessons for retail customer service

At DemoCamp17 he got a chance to present that chart and more…

Just a few days before the event was scheduled, I was asked by a couple friends if I could fill in a slot at DemoCamp17 in Toronto on the subject of “The state of Wireless in Canada Sucks”. You can thank Dave Crow for the title, who made it up and the theme by preannouncing it on his blog. Source: Wirelessnorth.ca » Blog Archive » The State of Wireless in Canada Sucks – Democamp 17

Here is his deck via SlideShare…

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Time to call your MP
So how can we fix this?  The mobile world is moving on without us and the country that invented the Blackberry and many of the other technologies being used all over the world isn’t even a part of it.  The iPhone?  I don’t really care about that, but I’d love to have an EVDO card that I could affordably use in both Canada and the US.

I think it’s time to start bugging our MPs.  Emails, phone calls … we need our MPs to know that this is a serious problem for Canada and the CRTC needs to do something about it.

No, I’m not usually in favour of the government telling businesses what to do but in this case … Here’s how to contact your MP (search by postal code).

I saw and found this on TechVibes.

Post from: EveryJoe

Something needs to be done about exorbitant data rates in Canada–call your MP!