Quit with AA because of rubbish communication

  • Rolebama's Avatar
    About an hour ago I had an email supposedly from the AA saying I had won a prize. Just pay £2 p&p. Credit card payments only. It looked legitimate, so I went for it using my wife's card. Payment was refused and it struck me as odd. Promptly cancelled wife's card before any money could be taken.
    I thought I would do the decent thing and contact the AA to advise that there could be a scam in their name. Listened to their menu and entered the number which I thought would be most likely to get a human being to talk to. After I had explained the real reason for my call, they hung up. I was not happy. I tried again on another number, and eventually, after another menu, spoke to someone else. At this point I had been on the phone listening to a variety of menus, frustration won out and I decided to cancel my membership with them. After yet another set of menus, I spoke to a person about cancelling. I was offered all kinds of enticements to stay, but, essentially, I just wanted to tell them of the suspected scam. I spent half an hour on the phone listening to menus and talking to people who never at any point offered to put me through to anyone who would be remotely interested in what I had to say. If someone had told me my name was being used in any suspicious way, I would want to know about it.
    Anyway, I will be an RAC member as of next week.
  • 6 Replies

  • Drivingforfun's Avatar
    I'd say it's not a surprise that people at the bottom of a company, who have no real interest in the company's image, don't really care. It's very different to being protective of your own name or that of a company you actually own or are personally invested in

    If they spent time listening they may well end up missing targets and be chastised from some manager above them, or something similar

    Not that I agree in any way, just trying to see it from the PoV of someone who probably feels in a dead-end career. It's definitely a shame that "doing the right thing for no personal gain" is no longer a priority for quite a few people 😕
  • Rolebama's Avatar
    I have dialled those 'How's my Driving' numbers a few times over the years to pass compliments to drivers. It is quite obvious when they answer the phone they have the attitude of "Oh dear, another complaint". When I initially state that my call is a complimentary one, you can feel the smile emerge. I am quite surprised that they have no system in place for compliments, yet they always assure me that my comments will be passed on.
    I have never used any of these numbers to complain about another driver.
  • Beelzebub's Avatar
    About an hour ago I had an email supposedly from the AA saying I had won a prize. Just pay £2 p&p. Credit card payments only. It looked legitimate, so I went for it using my wife's card. Payment was refused and it struck me as odd. Promptly cancelled wife's card before any money could be taken.
    I thought I would do the decent thing and contact the AA to advise that there could be a scam in their name. Listened to their menu and entered the number which I thought would be most likely to get a human being to talk to. After I had explained the real reason for my call, they hung up. I was not happy. I tried again on another number, and eventually, after another menu, spoke to someone else. At this point I had been on the phone listening to a variety of menus, frustration won out and I decided to cancel my membership with them. After yet another set of menus, I spoke to a person about cancelling. I was offered all kinds of enticements to stay, but, essentially, I just wanted to tell them of the suspected scam. I spent half an hour on the phone listening to menus and talking to people who never at any point offered to put me through to anyone who would be remotely interested in what I had to say. If someone had told me my name was being used in any suspicious way, I would want to know about it.
    Anyway, I will be an RAC member as of next week.
    Have you tried calling the RAC to see if they're any better?
  • Rolebama's Avatar
    To be honest - no. Should a situation arise where I feel the need to contact them for other than roadside services, I will make my mind up then.
  • olduser's Avatar
    I think most large organisations are the same with regard to communication, the call centre may or may not be part of the organisation you are calling about, and they will be working to a script, the script writer will probably not have covered what we are calling about anyway, so the operative is trying to use the nearest script to our enquiry.
    On top of that the operative is on her/his 9 hundredth and 99th call today, and needs a pee, we have no chance.

    The Banks think they found an answer a Chatbot - programmed with a list of standard answers to standard questions but the result is the same, our question is not standard, so we get an answer to a question we didn't ask but I suppose its better, the Chatbot didn't want a pee.
    There are no phone numbers no Email addresses, so we can just like it or lump it or as Rolebama did try else where.