I followed the suggestion that I contact McDonald’s about the bad sandwiches and service at their local store lately. Along with my basic complaint, I included a link to my blog post concerning the last episode of poor quality food, which also includes a link to the first post, which has to do with an inedible dried out chicken sandwich.
I thought my issues were clearly and completely stated!
Dried-out bun, wilted lettuce, soggy tomato, leather-like breaded chicken cutlet: Of course I want to pay $6.05 for it!
I found this message from McDonald’s in my e-mail:
Hello Douglas:
Thank you for taking the time to contact McDonald’s Customer Service Center. We always appreciate hearing from our customers.
Please know we take customer feedback very seriously and would like to address your comments appropriately. However, from your e-mail I was unable to determine the exact reason for your contacting McDonald’s. Please either call our Customer 800 Number at 800-244-6227 or send another e-mail through our website, www.mcdonalds.com, to provide additional information so that we can best address your comments.
Again, thank you for taking the time to contact McDonald’s Customer Service Center. We hope to hear from you soon.
Alexandria
McDonald’s Customer Response Center
ref#:12495675
I called the 800 number. After several preliminary messages about W-2s, employment, etc., etc., it suggested I speak one of several prompts to get specific help. My word was “feedback”, and a customer service representative came on reasonably soon after I spoke it.
Strangely, though I had and gave him the reference number listed in the e-mail, I had to go through the whole business of my telephone number, my address, blah-blah-blah, though everything he needed to address my issues was in my original e-mail.
I tried to bite a chunk out of the sandwich.
I barely managed to get a bite, but then I couldn’t chew the tough chunk. I spat it back out!
That, it seems, was too confusing for McDonalds, so I was forced to go through the whole business again. In fact, I read him the blog post word for word: What was not to understand there??? Their Alliance store sells customers dried out crap from time to time, and I have been the customer too many times who paid for that dried out crap.
Comprende? Verstehen? How about Lao – ເຂົ້າໃຈ? The English seemed clear enough to me!
The customer service representative seemed perplexed. What did I hope would be done, what would make things OK?
By that time, I was in no mood. “I don’t care what you do about it. They serve dried out crap at that store from time to time, and you lost a customer.”
As the French say, merde! And not the nice French, either. Did I tell you I didn’t stay on the phone after this conversation for the little survey? I doubt they could make sense of what I had to say.
Amazing. Earlier today I was reading about a girl in England who had several of the employees at a McDonald’s laugh at her for ordering 6 cheeseburgers and 4 orders of fries. It was for her and her three siblings, but regardless, it was totally inappropriate. Why should they care what she orders or what she eats?
People can be very narrow-minded….! I know people who freak out at the idea of ketchup on steak, yet they pour steak sauce on them. It’s all a matter of personal likes and dislikes, eh?!
Maybe it is time to avoid them. I have not been to a McDonald in 18 years or so and I don’t miss them 🙂
That’s my conclusion.
Doug, stay away from McDonald’s – I won’t tell you what I think of them – it’s too rude!
Try other options or cook healthy meals preferably!
Happy Tuesday!
They have been my “too busy to fix something” outlet over the years, but there are other options, for sure. I’m doing as you suggest.
Cooking might be a great thing to do – of course I don’t mean complicated dishes, it’s possible to cook easy, cheap, quick and tasty dishes! Go for it!
I’m a pretty decent cook. I’m also cooking for just myself, which is difficult to do without making too much.
Quantity isn’t a problem you can cook once and keep it on the fridge for later on or freeze it – it will always be the food you can trust – besides, that food can become a very different dish or not, that’s up to you!
Yes, add some new vegetables or freshen it up with a new sauce. I am clever that way, but I have never learned how to make just enough spaghetti, for example, something that can be frozen but that I just don’t care to eat that often.
I never tried to freeze spaghetti, is it even possible? If I cook too much I prefer keeping it in the fridge for one or two days and then eat it. I am sure you don’t need any advice as far as cooking is concerned!
It is, but it isn’t the best solution to too much spaghetti. I think it changes the texture in a unpleasant way.
Stick with Wendy’s and Burger King 🙂
Neither is in this town, but I get the point. I quite agree!
Stupid person! I for one, am proud you called….this is something a man abhors doing. What a ding dong at the other end. A replacement sandwich would have been nice. These must be school kids that haven’t learned better telephone skills. So much for McDonald’s…any friend that tells me they’re off to McDonald’s will hear about your story. I don’t like them anyhow so they won’t miss me.
Jean
I was- and am- amazed there was any question what my issues with their store are. If they want the business, they’ll “get it” If not, they can watch their profits continue to shrink, their market share drop.
Oh, for crying out loud! They just don’t want to make the effort to do some investigation and correction, do they? Boycott …
I just got another e-mail. They apologise for not dealing with the issue, ask for the address of the store, which they mistakenly place in North Dakota, not Nebraska. Now, I have to wait till they “open” at 5 am my time so I can call them to striaghten them out so they can send the complaint to the local store. I don’t think all this hassle is worth it, frankly, and I can’t see doing business with that store again at any rate.
They do not care
You are just a small fry in a very large basket
That’s why they make it so hard to call customer service
You are the exception to the rule
Most people wouldn’t do what you did
That’s why McDonald’s is losing it’s footing in the fast food business
They have all pockets with no pants
They certainly aren’t making a believer out of me.They lost my business already.
omgosh! this update was worse than I thought! I agree – blood and the head of the manager (rummages in closet to find torch and pitchfork)
Seems there is some confusion about the state the store is in. Jeez!
lol The Peter Principle
Exactly!
I stopped going to McDonald’s about 20 years ago because they didn’t listen. Obviously nothing has changed.
I’ve joined the former customer crowd just this year.
Good of you for hanging on and getting through to a human voice although the human sounded like he could care less.
Reminds me of the VA where they keep you on hold for a long time switching you from rep to rep hoping you will hang up and give up.
So frustrating.
I’m done with it, though there is one last call I need to make because they somehow got the idea the store is in North Dakota, not Nebraska.
It gets exhausting dealign with morons doesn’t it.
As I pointed out this morning when I called to get them straightened out on which state this store is in, this is all about a stupid sandwich and not a world crisis that should take so much effort to resolve.
I know that they employ not the brightest bulb in the shop but that they have those m***ns even at work at the complaint hotline makes McD seem rather … m***nic as a company.
I sometimes think companies hire people who are incapable of thinking outside a narrow range of possibilities to handle complaints. I handled them at my factory, and the first thing you did was remove all the barriers between the customer and you. More times than not, customers had reasonable issues that were not that difficult to resolve or forward to the appropriate engineers for resolutions. In many cases, all they wanted was their money back, not an explanation of why something failed or was less than they expected. Deal with the money issue, then work through the causes with the idea of improving the product or processes. It isn’t brain surgery or rocket science! In my case, all I want to know is they deal with this store and their poor handling of food and customers. In the meantime, I won’t spend money there.
How can you still use the words “it is not brain surgery” with Ben Carson around who tries to sell his view on the Egyptian pyramids as wheat storage of Joseph’s times … His original statement may date back a while but just last Wednesday he has confirmed he still believes that – despite scientific evidence against it (first of all, not all pyramids are of the same age, as they should be according to his theory, second, the pyramids took so long to build that it was not practical to build those for storing surplus wheat, and third there was not a lot of room in those pyramids that could be used to store wheat). I will never be able to use the phrase “that is not brain surgery” ever again. It is not rocket science is slightly blemished, too: There was this scientist at the NASA who wore a misgynistic shirt when he knew he would be on the TV …
Ugh! I fringe to think he is a serious candidate for the presidency! I’d never heard that silly theory until he brought it up. Apparently, that used to be one people held, as improbable as it is and as ridiculous it is that any people would build large piles of stone to store small amounts of grain.
When people lived in the middle ages and heard of those pyramids they did not know that most of those structures was solid stone. Hence they developed the “granary”-theory. But today we KNOW they were wrong.
Yes, and that pretty much places Carson intellectually, doesn’t it? Scary to think he is running near the top of the pack, next to a blowhard narcissist billionaire. Shit!
http://www.ceoemail.com/s.php?id=9895
Looks like a great reference, CB. I’ll see what comes of my last encounter. This list might lead me to the next one.
I can’t vouch for its correctness, but it’s worth a try …
I started out with “It is irritating, but not worth getting in contact with the store,” to “Blood and the head of the manager are the least I can accept.” I don’t know if there is much to be gained by doing more than not going to the store any more. It’s not a favorite eatery, just one that was handy on certain occasions.
If it is a franchise there may not be much McDonalds Corp can do
I’m sure that’s what it is. I don’t really care at this point: I don’t go there any longer. I’m sorry I even took it to the next step. I should have left it with my blog posts.
Bravo for braving a computerized phone system! I try to avoid those things!
Ultimately, it was human being on the other end, but he seemed unable to follow me complaint.
Are you sure it wasn’t a computer-generated voice? Some of them can sound deceptively human… I always ask to speak to a supervisor – they usually have flesh and blood.
It was a human alright, just not a very tune-in one.