Positively Outrageous Service

Positively Outrageous Service-- A term coined by this man... http://www.tscottgross.com/ T. Scott Gross.

After many negative dealings with At&T here at work and a rep that is about to drive the office up a wall I got a fluke call from AT&T about something else. I mentioned the service issues I have been having with the rep and asked what could be done about it.

The rep was taken back by my complaints and seemed to be a little side swiped by my request to get another rep. The man I was talking to handles another one of our accounts for the same service and I asked him point blank, I like you pretty good, why don't you take the account for us?
He stopped and thought for a moment then told me he had to check with his manager and find out a few things and call me back.

He returned with a follow up call that I would have to deal with the reps manager to get a new rep. I told him I wanted the two account combined and I wanted to only deal with him. He is the first rep I haven't wanted to hang up on. He told me that would be not possible. I asked him what would be possible if I pulled this account out of their phone book. He told me he would call me back.

The return call was kind of funny about policy and a lot of stuttering. AT&T is still working on it after I refused to accept that I would have to stay with the same rep.

This reminded me of POS. If AT&T would give their reps and even managers the empowerment to make decisions to keep customers happy how would it effect their over all feeling. Thinking about WOM as a component how would I be reacting currently to the service I received? Would I still be thinking about switching to that national rep who is going to cut AT&Ts over all profit for the year on this account? All this situation will take is a little POS for me to keep my marketing there and fully and I might even spread some good WOM.