Porsche dealer - "I got it wrong with the buy one get one free card".

Written by Jenny Shu

Thursday, 22 February 2007

Glen Fergusson - Sales and Marketing manager for a brand new Californian Porsche dealer. Has lost his job and faces possible legal proceedings as the company strives to reclaim the costs of the 18 Porches given away free under Glen's Opening day "buy one get one free promotion" "I admit I didn't really do the numbers properly on this one" said Glen who told reporters that he had "seen the concept work really well for coffee stores" and in terms of numbers you could argue that Glen's campaign worked. As the new Porsche dealer sold 18 Porches in the first hour of the store opening. It took the head office a full hour to realise what was going on and subsequently shut the store. Local man Bruce Stepper took out a second mortgage on his home after getting a promotional flyer in his mailbox. "I am ecstatic - I brought a shiny red Porsche today, got another one free and I have sold just sold it on EBay, all up I end up getting a Porsche 911 for $5000" Jane Cameron was arguably even more entrepreneurial. The local Janitor purchased a Porsche using the dealers "no deposit finance plan for low income earners", sold both cars, paid off the finance account and walked away with $120,000 profit. The finance plan was another one of Glen's initiatives that has now been cancelled. A red faced Glen stated "I have never really been too good at Math and I was sure the whole time we were making money - I was initially blown away by the amount of cars we were selling in that first hour. I had seen the "buy one get one free card" work extremely well for the new coffee shop down the road and thought what a great idea I will try it here." National spokesman for the dealership chain was quoted as saying "We are just glad that the idiot didn’t have time to run with his 'test drive 5 cars, get one free loyalty stamp card' campaign.

Another day in Technical Suport

No joke, actual call:

"Thank you for calling National City Technical Support, I'm Stawn Kaufman. How can I help you?"

"Hi, yes I'm doing my taxes and I was trying to view my transactions for 2006. The search is only going back to December. How do I go back to see the rest of the year?"

"Unfortunately, you can only view 90 days of activity via the Online Banking website."

"Oh. But there's a search bar here, and I'm searching for earlier in the year."

"Unfortunately, you can only view 90 days of activity via the Online Banking website. The search bar allows you to search within that timeframe."

"I really need to access this information, how can I get it, do I log in somewhere else?"

(...ok, maybe she's just a slow learner)

"Unfortunately. You can only. View 90. Days. Of activity online."

"Well obviously you still store the information somewhere, how do I access it?"

"Ma'am. It's not possible. You can only view 90 days of activity online."

"Can I pay to have it made available to me?"

"No."

(...)

"Would you like to order copies of those paper statements?"

"No, I have all of those, but I didn't want to have to do everything manually. There used to be more information available online, why did you change it?"

"We have actually increased the amount of information available on the website every year."

"Oh. 90 days of activity really isn't very much. How am I supposed to do my taxes?"

"Ma'am, how did you do your taxes ten years ago?"

(click.)

Another customer issue resolved.