How not to manage customer relations

One arrived in via email yesterday afternoon, from my insurance company (Farmers Insurance). It touted its “Go Paperless” program, in which its customers could elect to receive policy-related documents electronically (gee…what a cutting edge idea!). Sounds innocuous, right? But here’s where the wheels come off:

The footnote reiterates: Not all policies qualify at this time. The Go Paperless banner will only display if you qualify for the paperless option.

So, they want me to go to the trouble of logging into their website in order to find out if I qualify? If they know my status already, why didn’t they take that into account before sending the email?

To add insult to injury, I inexplicably don’t qualify, even though I pay all my premiums (three policies worth) online. But – and here’s the other flaw in this approach – how can I be sure that there isn’t just a glitch in their system, or in my browser settings, or in my internet connection, that temporarily disabled or otherwise prevented that banner from displaying? This is a poor way to roll out a new feature, from several perspectives.

Then there’s my cable/internet provider, Suddenlink. They went to the expense of mailing a letter that contains this ominous paragraph (emphasis mine):

Is it obvious that Suddenlink is announcing they’re raising their rates? (And, indeed, the bill that arrived this morning via email* reflects a 5% increase.) They’re making their customers work to figure that out. And the “insult to injury” factor in this case is the apology for the implied burden “these changes” (whatever they might be).

These are both examples of how companies do a disservice to their customers, the first by taking technological shortcuts and the second by generating disingenuous and ambiguous communication.