One Way to Kill Future Sales

What do you get when you cross a fraudulent credit card transaction with a customer calling in to dispute the charge? Apparently, an opportunity to sell!

My initial plan when noticing a recurring transaction on my statement the last three months was to call my credit card bank and dispute the charges, but instead I chose to call the company billing me. Interesting response.

When they saw “my” account had a completely different phone number and email address associated with it, I told them I wanted all three $39.95 charges immediately credited back to me along with a confirmation email, I got this response:

“So…would you be interested in giving us a try and subscribing to our service after all?”

He followed his protocol. He did what he thought was right — try to turn a negative into a positive. And while I have no use for his company’s products or services, I certainly won’t be using them now out of principle.

When your company has inadvertently caused people frustration or anger, it’s best to show empathy, take action to fix the problem, and then let the wounds heal before shifting into sales mode. You will alienate most buyers doing this.