With all these horrible stories, it is obvious that something is terribly, terribly wrong there.
One of the more consistent complaints regarding P&C points repeatedly to the packing department - which is the last stop in the sales process, before your order/package sits at the staging area, awaiting loading/transporting - and that informs me that their is little to no oversight/quality control with the pickers/packers.
This is big problem #1.
For illustration purposes only, let us imagine P&C has 10 full-time guys who pick and pack your orders. I have no idea if P&C has 2 guys or 200 guys; but for the sake of discussion, let's just say the number is: 10 guys.
If just one of those guys - we'll call him: Jack, Jack Mehoff; and, if Jack is a slack-jawed, bad-attitude, doesn't give a rats-tail, clock-watching, wage-complainer, who carelessly tosses your orders together as fast and carelessly as he can, so he can get back to impressing the other employees who are trying to pack the other orders, with his tall-tales of glorious bank-shots at last nights pool-league, how many shots of whiskey he did last night, and the bar-maid he lanced behind the bar, well, that means that roughly 10% of all out-going orders are likely to have an issue with either: accuracy, completeness, damage occuring in transport, or, the uncaring and sloppy presentation the contents makes upon the customer when it arrives and is opened in your home - provided and assuming, your package and it's contents arrive undamaged in shipping.
10%. That is a huge amount.
And, and if P&C only has 5 guys in their entire picking/packing department, or worse, 2 of that joker I described above, then the potential number of problem orders skyrockets to 20% - 40%.
The sad fact is, if they only have 2 full-time picking/packing guys, and one is the unsupervised bad apple, and, the other employee, the good one, is too scared to straighten-out his co-worker, or unable to report Jack to the non-existent shipping manager, well then, that number shoots up to a ruinous 50% Customer Dissatisfaction potential.
And, that is when the CS phones start ringing off the hook... and you get left on perpetual hold.
Besides the negative visual impact and negative message which is put on the customer when a problem order is received, is the fall-out from that 10% of shipments which potentially have issues/anomalies, then sets off an entire chain of time-wasting and extra expense incurring 'fixes' as the company responds - all of which, suck-up the valuable time of Customer Service employees, and time wasted executing the action-sequence which follows; and all for the company to correct that which should not need correction in the first place - had proper oversight/quality control management been in place at the picking/packing level.
Now, I haven't the foggiest what and where the actual problems within P&C lay; but, I do know this:
If the problem/fault is not with 'Labor', then, it must be with 'Management'; or worse, both.
The other thing I know is this, Time will tell the tale; however, before we learn the real story behind all the problems and customer complaints, the next sound we may hear is: "The number you have reached is not is service, please check the number and dial again... The number you have reached is not is service, please check the number and dial again... ".
I hope they can pull themselves together before that time comes. - Sherm Natman
