on hold
We're moving on Sept 1, and I know just the guys to call for a truck. Handy Andy. The store with the trucks is on sleazy aurora avenue, where the only thing cheaper than the goods are the services. No way I would ever call U-haul again. First of all, the large credit card deposit. The on-hold phone tree. The central ordering with the links to what the computer shows they have in actual locations. The credit check. The questions about insurance. Once you get there, they print out your information on a form on a dot matrix printer, then you sign a copy feeling like elmer fudd with the dead sea scrolls. Until you've had an authentic customer experience, like the kind you get at Handy Andy, it all might seem terribly necessary and makes everybody seem important.
Here's what happened instead. I call the local phone number. Someone answers. "Handy Andy, can you hold?"
"Sure" I answer.
Then, HE PUTS THE PHONE DOWN and I hear what's happening while I'm waiting to be helped. He's helping another customer, one who walked in. Fair enough. No music. No threat of anyone else calling. I hear them conducting the transaction. It's very channel 9. Then he picks up.
"How are you doing for trucks at the end of the month?" I ask.
"Not so bad, we just need a couple days notice" he says.
"How bout I give you notice on the phone now?"
"That's fine, what size do you want?"
"Um, you have the same sizes as u-haul, right? The 14 and the 17 foot?"
"Yeah, we have the 17 foot. What day?"
"The 31st, return on the 2nd."
"First name?"
"Beth."
"Okay, I have you down. It will be 30 bucks a day and 30 cents a mile."
"Sounds great, see you then." and we hang up.
Anyone who has ever done u-haul knows this is completely unheard of. This is the real nostalgia, the feeling we have for full serve gas stations and never ending refills on coffee. It's not manufactured nostalgia, like crowing about how many years of customer service you've had or whatever, while your customer is on hold. It's not a teenager from the suburbs wearing a white paper hat serving you a milkshake from a time neither of you remember. This is just a place that thankfully hasn't evolved to whatever age of glorious customer service we're supposed to be living in at the moment. It's nice.