is dealing with people that don’t listen/read/remember and are rude.
I booked a customer, a just-about-to-be-married customer for what we call a Reunion session. I explained, via email and phone (and I do HAVE those emails) about the process, the procedures, the policies, etc. for the session. She said she loved my work and wanted to work with me. Booked.
Fast forward a few weeks and her mother-in-law to be comes into the studio to upgrade the session and I go through ALL the details with her … the procedures, the policies, etc. Booked. Date set.
Fast forward a month and we hold the session. Everyone was very nice. The session had a great tone — very fun, enjoyable, great family.
Fast forward one week — the ordering session. I begin with the slideshow (as usual). Then I say “Now we’re going to go through the images one by one so you can eliminate … ” and explain how it works and such. At that point, the Father-in-law rudely barks at me that I will NOT be pressuring him to order; that he and his family will be going home that night and will talk about what they want; and goes on and on — in one of the rudest manners ever about how this was his time and how I won’t be pressuring them.
My response, outside of the deep, dark fury I was feeling, was to re-explain the procedure. That the local people will place an order of ‘x’ amount and then there will be gallery access for anyone else to order but that the online gallery is not for decision making purposes — just for fun and enjoyment while images are being processed.
Mr. Rude-Man pipes up again with his insistence that I am apparently not playing by the rules (except don’t *I* make the rules?) 🙂 During this 30+ minute tirade and exchange of “pleasantries” (I promise I was not rude, just trying desparately to hold my ground) my Assistant was there and witnessed the entire exchange. He went on and on and even suggested that had he known all this, I “wouldn’t have taken one single photo”.
Daughter-in-law was also there and decides to ask (quite politely I must add) to continue with the process. Mother-in-law is silent the whole time — or virtually — can you say intimidated?
So, we proceed. And during my focus on daughter-in-law the Big-Jerk pipes up regularly that he wants a “big one” like “that one” and points to a 20×30 on the wall — though he adds that he’ll “get it framed somewhere else”.
Now, during this “conversation” I am asked by Son if they were supposed to know this policy stuff already. My answer was ‘yes’ — that it was explained to daughter-in-law to be from the beginning because she was the contact point … and just to prove that … here is a quick email exchange we’d had …
When asked about online access (which is something we give ONLY with a minimum purchase) and how long they’ll have …
“Yes, there will be a gallery — assuming you meet the minimum purchase ($x), which, again, with two local families alone, I’m sure you will. 🙂 Others will have an entire week to view, enjoy and consider with online ordering for them.” from email dated July 23, 2008 to daughter-in-law to be.
Rude-guy continued to interrupt our entire 1.5 HOURS of ordering. Eventually, daughter-in-law that was present spent the minimum just to shut up rude-man. 🙂 Kudos to her. She even commented “Joe, I’m sure you’re mad at me now.”
He told me as he left that he would have an order “probably by Monday” and guess what? Nothing. Nada. Nil. Zilch. Could I have guessed that? Yes. That’s just not what online galleries are for.
And, of course, at the end, I re-explained that the gallery would be online for 1 week, during which time they could enjoy the photos (which he probably heard : copy them off as quickly as possible) and then after that the images would be purged – unpurchased ones.
After the ordering was done, I called new-daughter-in-law (was to-be) and gave her access. She asked me how it went and I explained that there was some miscommunication. I was trying to be polite. Ron suggested I should have laid it all out there.
NO ONE defended me. I was the bad guy. Egad. I took pictures and wanted to charge them for them! Oh my!
So, two days before their gallery was set to expire, out went an automated message reminding them and I get this from new-daughter-in-law:
“Why will our gallery expire when we have met the requirement of the $x minimum purchase?”
Um … hello? So I responded.
“The $x is unrelated. That’s a minimum studio purchase.
Galleries are considered an extra and are made available for the purpose of enjoying photos for a short period of time while orders begin processing. They expire one week after the studio ordering date which is also the date unpurchased images are purged.”
So guess what? No additional orders. No big “20×30” print.
And tomorrow, what will happen? All those unpurchased images will be PURGED.
And what have I learned from this? People suck! Ok, not all of them. But I have decided, with Ron’s “ok” that if I’m EVER talked to like that I will gladly give up the money. It was ridiculous and I just kept keeping my mouth shut in the interest of “customer service”. I have learned … thanks to these idiots.
As a matter of fact, I had another customer try to get me to eat $10 in shipping because
“We’ve paid quite a bit for the photos already and have traveled 45 min. each way twice to see you and give you business. I would ask you to absorb the $10 as part of your costs.”
Ha! I’ve had customers spend 5x what she spent and driven the same mileage 4-5 times to pick up their prints. She got the brunt of my frustration with a very short and sweet response. 🙂 I’m not giving in anymore.
Perhaps that will give me a reputation as being inflexible — I don’t know. But the reality is that 98% of my customers are awesome. They appreciate us and we appreciate them. They spend what they want — high or low — and get great images. THAT is my goal. My goal is not to make every rude-ridiculous-idiot happy because I’m on his time. He’s on mine.
I keep trying to let this darn situation go, but every time I try, it haunts me in a dream. I look back over what I said and did … trying to find a point that I did it wrong. I can’t find one. I just can’t. Except that I let it go on too long and his rudeness invaded my psyche. It won’t happen again.
Argh! 🙂