Don’t you just love when you great get service from a business!  It does happen and it usually makes your day.  When I receive over-the-top service, I generally take the time to let someone know.  Unfortunately, I am one of the minority as more people take the time to remark on bad service than good. There is as much satisfaction in telling someone “Thanks you did a great job” and the response you receive is generally more pleasant. Lately though, I find, the complainers are causing some issues for me when I try to say “Good Job” to someone.

With today’s technology, it is so much easier to comment on service than ever before and more people are doing just that. Just point, click, vent while typing and hit submit.  Social Media outlets like Facebook have taken it one step farther – you can post your two cents on Facebook to your friends and they’ll tell their friends and so on and so on – just like the Faberge Shampoo commercial in the 1970s except 2 friends have turned into hundreds!  There are websites set up to “rate” services of businesses and people and more incensed consumers have even set up websites dedicated to their specific rant and specific company.

This “Comment Card  Revolution” has taken the Complaint Department to a whole new level.  A level that is starting to cause a problem for those of us who have positive comments to deliver. It is most prominent when I ask a store employee for a comment card  (Yes, most places still have their comment cards).  The problem?    I am not sure I have ever gotten a different response other than ” Oh! Is there something wrong?” or “Oh! Was there a problem?”

The “Complainers” of the world have made it so that most employees and management automatically assume you “had a negative experience” when asked for a comment card.  The assumption that staff has done something wrong, kind of puts a damper on my happiness as I go to write about my great experience.

We recently moved and were living in a rental while waiting to move into our new home.  The Super we dealt with gave us great service and was very flexible with regards to our short term situation.  Seeing that the rental company’s website had a few testimonials, I sent in my comments via the website.  In the office a few weeks later, the Super thanked me for the “nice words” which had been forwarded on to him – “It is very nice to see kind words as they are rare” , the secretary also thanked me.   Rare indeed, the next week I was in to drop off a key as we were moving out and he took me over and introduced me to a man in a suit – the “Boss” of  the Property Management company.  I was introduced simply as “Kathy, the lady who wrote the nice letter on the website”.  It was kind of amusing, yet flattering.

That is what happens though to those who take the time to say something nice – you get rewarded for it in the end – similar to the “Pay it Forward” Philosophy. My reward that day was the chuckle I got from being known for my “nice letter”.

Though many expect to hear the “bad” they love to hear the “good” even more.  Let this be a challenge for everyone, the next time you have a postive service experience – use the technology of today – or even one of those comment cards (it is fun to watch staff as you write them out) and let it be known you were happy. Even if you may not be directly rewarded, someone will be pleased to listen to your kind words. I am hoping that eventually maybe people will stop asking “Was there a problem?” and start thinking “Oh Boy! Another good one!”

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