Don’t let propsects off the hook too quickly

Welcome to the secret shopping blog, our diary of the secret shopping world.

I wish I had a recording of a call I was on yesterday. I was calling my satellite TV company to cancel service. School has started and there won’t be much time for our kids to watch TV. I also know that they will have more fun doing interesting things if there are fewer channels to watch. I was planning on going with the most basic cable plan and save us a bunch of money every month and save the kids from getting their little brains fried.

One other reason I wanted to quit was because we lose satellite reception during storms. One thing that I really like is to be able to see the radar picture of our local area to know if a storm will go tornadic on us. We get enough severe storms that it is good to know these things. AND the time I really need to see the radar screen is during the big storm when the satellite won’t receive.

The customer specialist who was supposed to help me change my mind and keep the service asked why I wanted to quit. I said, “I can’t afford it any more”. I figured she would not have a very good come back for that and I wanted to see if she had a comeback. She took my response on face value, which was her first mistake. People will lie to you, especially when they are trying to quit your service. Had she asked some more questions, she would have found out that, yes I did want to save money, but the radar picture was my main motivator.

She offered me a heck of a deal to stay. She was going to give me 2 months for free and then bill only $9.95 a month for six months for a very basic package. That would have added up to a substantial savings. I told her “no thanks” anyway. But then she let me off the hook. I was really tempted to say yes. Had she said something like, “I know I just offered you a heck of a deal to stay. If you said no to it, then saving money is not the only reason you want to quit. So I know you have another reason you haven’t told me yet. What is the other reason?”

Then she would have had me. I did not have a second feint for her and I would have had to confess that the radar was the “big” issue. Or I would have had to say I wanted fewer channels for my kids to watch.

Then she could have pointed out that Tornado and storm season in my area was about done…that by the time my free months and discounted months ended it would be getting to be storm season and I could quit then if I still wanted to. And she could have told me that I could get storm notification service from several different websites that would let me know if there was a tornado warning by my home, so I could get even better information than the radar. And she could have said she was helping me get fewer channels by giving me the discounted package.

I would have had to say yes to her offer and stay for another 8 months.

But she let me off the hook and I didn’t feel like making the sale for her. So I will enjoy the new cable service and wonder who I need to talk to at her company to help with their sales persistence training. Bye for now, Tron

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Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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