Wordpress is where this blog is hosted.  They had a 20 minute outage last night, and the owner, Matt, posted an apology, and explanation.  The entire post is self effacing, and practical.  The 90 comments are universally supportive.  How many Banks would get that response to an outage? These guys try, they are open about it, and they continually improve, bit by bit.  No home runs … just quiet improvement.  I trust Matt and WordPress.  Even though its a free service, I happily pay for storage, and site editing capability. In particular I liked this last comment … they are building … Continue reading Short Downtime « WordPress.com – and customers are happy!

 We could debate the verb, talk about how customers will tell us how their experience was, etc, but I buy Ron’s assertion that firms need to take this seriously.  Its not just a question of measuring the outcomes.  It requires pro-active activities, cultural shifts, and I would suggest openness to achieve positive results. When CEM first started appearing as a term a few years ago, I thought it was the perfect antidote to reengineering. Whereas reengineering was about process redesign from the firm’s POV (reduce cost and cycle time), I thought CEM would evolve to be about process redesign from the … Continue reading Customer Experience Management – Ron worries for its future

 I wonder how many Banks or departments, are not aware of this significant change.  It was pushed through quickly in the US, but the Canadian change was very quiet – can’t be seen to be following those Americans, of course. Daylight Savings Time (DST) in the United States will begin earlier and end later in 2007 than in years past. The Energy Policy Act of 2005, signed into law August 2005, moves the beginning of DST from the first Sunday in April to the second Sunday in March. DST will now end the first Sunday in November instead of the last … Continue reading Change to Daylight Savings Time, Canada and US

 This is a large outsource deal from Credit Suisse.  I would expect more Banks to do this.  Large Banks have networks the size of small countries and as may people to manage them.  There really is no competitive advantage in that space for a Bank. Financial services giant Credit Suisse is outsourcing the operation of its critical data and communications networks to British telecom provider BT Group and Swiss telco Swisscom under a deal worth $1.1 billion, BT disclosed Monday. In a statement, Credit Suisse CIO Tom Sanzone said the deal will allow the bank to access state-of-the-art telecom technologies, … Continue reading Credit Suisse Outsources to BT in Deal Worth $1.1 Billion

 There is a lot of stuff going on in the world today.  Chris is a thoughtful developer (aren’t they all) but this post is exceptional relative to the disruption internet creates.  The whole post is worth the read. This is the path forward, and the path that I prefer to any kind of control, ownership or dictatorship. I believe that it also the one of the BarCamp community, and so long as we are able to accede to our environment and always respond to it positively, productively and optimistically, I think that we stand a chance to see the change … Continue reading Open: the path through disruptive times

 This is a fantastic description of the social power that internet harnesses.  It touches on the wisdom of crowds in an articulate way.  Hat tip Stowe. .. the insight that a networked culture is enabling a new form of bottom-up power, as diverse groups of dispersed people pool their expertise and confront problems that are much more complex than they could handle individually. They are able to do so because of the ways that new media platforms support the emergence of temporary social networks that exist only as long as they are needed to face specific challenges or respond to the … Continue reading "diverse groups of dispersed people pool their expertise and confront problems"

 JetBlue sufferred some catastrophic flight cancellations during an ice storm over Valentines.  No doubt being lower on the totem pole at the airport, this resulted in people spending up to 8 hours in a plan on the tarmac, or 12 hours in the terminal. Matt here from 37 Signals does a good job at illustrating how to respond.  You cannot stop ice storms but you can learn how to react appropriately.  JetBlue are making this one up as they go, but they are trying, and it points to the need to perform periodic emergency drills at your Bank. Use your … Continue reading How a customer service disaster shows the company DNA – Jet Blue

Robert speaks here of a situation that happens to be with the merchant Second Life, but this is all too common. I hate how hard it is to cancel accounts like these. Companies are perfectly willing to charge you forever, even if you don’t use the service one bit. I think I’ll just call my credit card company and change my card number by saying I lost my card. Source:  http://scobleizer.com/2007/02/18/second-life-has-my-credit-card-and-wont-let-go/#comment-292461 Banks do an injustice to credit card holders.  Credit cards are 100% merchant centric.  Its just ludicrous that Robert should have to go through that to solve a $10 … Continue reading Credit Cards are not customer focussed

More on the  blog therapy to control credit card and spending problems.  UK newspaper, but topic is US based. Dozens of “debt blogs” are springing up in America, diaries in which the financially-challenged detail their struggles against spiralling credit card bills. Source: Financially insecure turn to blog therapy | International News | News | Telegraph   Technorati tags: blog+therapy, credit+counselling Continue reading Financially insecure turn to blog therapy