Different agent stores, help...
Direct is cingular owned and run corporate locations.They only sell cingular items, cingular branded devices.And dealing with them is like calling customer service as they are a extention of the company.
Indirect or authorized sellers,or re-sellers.They are independantly owned and run, they simply are licensed to sell service on behalf of the company.Being indirect means that you are subject to their buyers remorse policies.They tend to have licences with a few carriers unless they have an exclusive agreement with one carrier.
As an example a cingular corporate store will have a 30 day buyers remorse on phones, thats cingular's policy.Indirect can have the same policy or something a...
(continues)
My company that I work for is an exclusive agent, we only sell Cingular Wireless.
We also happen to be a premier agent, at least as far as I know. We've won the Golden Jack Award for the Philadelphia Market, and most recently we won Cingular's MVP Award for Best Agent.
Premiers, as far as I know, are made out to look like a company owned store.
averagejoe said:
And dealing with them is like calling customer service as they are a extention of the company.
this is true to a point. alot of the corp stores out here are money hungry bastages.
they know they won't turn a dime from helping the little old lady who doesn't know how to turn her phone on, and needs a few questions answered, so they usually send her to us indirect dealers, or CS themselves.
I get a kick out of it when i exceed her expectations, and then she brings me all of her friends and family who need phones though.
this is just what i have seen personally. this in no way reflects any people on this board, it's just 1 or 2 stores in my area.
AshDizzle said:
You are completely backwards. I'd say about 95% of all indirects send customer service problems to COR stores. You've have to be totally blind not to see that. COR stores will not send CS problems to indirects, that's completely ludicrous.
I'd say from talking to them all over the ladt 5 years its about 80% of indirects that refer to them to call customer care, and myabe 20% of corprate store reps that have had them call us back in customer service.
They do try to help out but indirects don't have the systems we do to acees more information on the customer's account, and normally the corp store when they call in either are just fairly new and inexpierienced.
No blame either way, ju...
(continues)
I can only look up number in my market (MTZ) and my powers are extremely limited even then.
especially for credits, MAN i wish i could credit people.
i can't even unsuspend users all the time.
Atavist Arise said:
we're all trained on issues and current tech watches and what not, but you are right as far as customer info.
I can only look up number in my market (MTZ) and my powers are extremely limited even then.
especially for credits, MAN i wish i could credit people.
i can't even unsuspend users all the time.
Don't take this thew wrong way, but i'm glad you can't credit.In the past some stores did, and they used suckers to credit towards phone prices, selling tactics, give em redit for valid charge just to get them outta the store, there is not need for those days again.
As for training, i know you get training but soemtimes things can change 3 times in one day, its happened ,and we...
(continues)
Well trained reps do what it takes to help the customer, period. They don't SEND people anywhere.
Turning this into an agent vs. corporate argument is the last thing this guy was looking for IMO.
Well trained reps, yes, will help the customer. And how many indirects are "well-trained reps"? Be realistic. You know what kind of reputation indirects have.
How many bad "direct" sales reps are there that can't be fired because of the big union.
I have met just as many "direct" morons as I have indirect. Realistic? Stop making up **** just for shock value.
Even though we do have to call customer service more often than not.
âšī¸
You KNOW this is true, you'd have to be an absolute IDIOT to think your chances of getting helped are better at a random mall kiosk then a random corporate store. And that is exactly my point. Sure there are idiots at corporate, I've met them. But there are a HELL of a lot more just plain shady joeshmo-buy-a-phone-i'll-...
(continues)
đ