Disconnected experiences in a connected world - ripe for disruption?!

I have to talk about this interesting but not so unique experience I am currently going through here to see how many of you can relate to it!

Scene1:

Scheduled a new AT&T business internet service for our new office in Addison (Dallas) last week to be effective the 3rd of June (6/3) so I get the typical emails and text messages confirming that a technician will arrive to perform the installation between 8AM-4PM (big window but nevertheless!)

Scene 2:

I wait patiently on 6/3 along with my colleagues working in a shared conference facility in the bldg and the technician doesn’t show up so I give AT&T a call and they now tell me that there has been an issue with the order and it has not been assigned to a technician work pool!

Scene 3:

AT&T now cancels the order and issues a new one with a due date of 6/10 (again 8AM-4PM) . I showed my displeasure at the due date given my business urgently needs it and the fact that I cannot be penalized for their miss. They now agree to expedite the installation for today(6/5) between 8AM-4PM! and I got confirmations via email about it (This interaction happened over a few phone calls atleast 20-25 mins each with me repeating the entire story everytime!). 

Scene 4:

I call AT&T again today (had asked them to set alerts on my account so got a couple of follow ups last night just to make sure everything is set for 6/5) and they tell me that they don’t have technicians to do the job and they can only do it on 6/10. 

Scene 5:

After chasing the love triangle between Support Specialists, Sales and Business teams at AT&T, I have been told that a technician will come to finish the work between 12-4PM today (6/5) so keeping my fingers crossed!

After marathon sessions with AT&T over the past couple of days, I am still fighting this experience with different support specialists, sales and business teams who cannot give me a definitive answer as to why the order on 6/3 didn’t work and why the one on 6/10 will work!

Customer Experience Journey has been terribly short on many fronts:

1. A schedule window which covers the entire day as opposed to a smaller window
2. No notifications that something went wrong with the order and so the installation schedule cannot go through for “x" reason
3. A new business internet account cannot be complicated enough to drive the customer to keep checking with AT&T continuously through the week without definitive results

On a more positive note, our Innovation team in Hyderabad on the other side of the world got their internet in literally 6 hours flat!

This definitely shows a big thumb of approval on our decision to continue investing and see that centre grow to build innovative platforms/products supporting global needs.

While I continue to keep you all updated on this journey, I am very interested to hear from those of you who see a huge disruption coming in this space and what it can do to big giants like AT&T who have heavily relied on their traditional network to generate business delivering suboptimal customer experiences!

What are your disconnected experiences in this connected world?!

Sid Nandi is an entrepreneur, business transformation leader, coach, technology strategy & management consultant experienced in helping organizations, business and technology undergo digital transformation with agility delivering customer centric products and solutions.

?His venture (Digital TaaS) provides management, strategy & delivery consulting specializing in digital transformations to help accelerate organizations transform their business, technology & operations in creating sustainable value in a digital world. He is passionate about connecting and collaborating with fervent transformation professionals from all industry verticals committed to building sustainable enterprises!.