TiVo customer service rocks!

I’m not often prone to using exclamation points in my post titles, but I think I’m justified in this instance. My past two dealings with TiVo customer service have been far and away the two most pleasant, intelligent and productive phone calls I’ve ever made to a call center. Granted, both times I’ve been on the receiving end of a (tiny) windfall of cash, so I can’t really complain. But I can rave.

The most recent call dealt with our aging, re-gifted TiVo Series 1. The 14-hour dinosaur got taken to my folks house post-Christmas as a “value added” present. I didn’t wrap it and they don’t want or need it, but I thought it was the thought that counted.

In any event, I called TiVo customer service to cancel my subscription to the thing since no one was using it (My folks disconnected the thing a few days after I set it up).

Now we’re not talking about a lot of money, $6.95 per month, but I wanted to take care of it sooner rather than later. I’d told my folks they could take advantage of the cheap rate through me, but if they’re not going to use the box, why bother. So I called to cancel service.

Mike, the rep who took my call, had me walk him through my thought process and offered a solution: no charge for service for 3 months! That’s right, he put $20.85 back on my credit card and now my folks can try TiVo at no charge. How cool is that?

Mike saw I was a devoted (4+ years) TiVo customer who had purchased a total of 3 units. He knew I loved TiVo and was trying to widen the circle of fans/evangelists/TiVo zombies. He took care of me without me having to ask. I love that about TiVo.

Mike and I talked about the weather (snow in Atlanta, dry heat in New Mexico where he was) and basically ended our transaction at that. My folks now have until May 12 to decide if they want TiVo for good. At least now they don’t have to sign a one year contract to make that choice and I don’t have to foot the bill either. Thanks, TiVo (and Mike)!

My previous experience was about a month ago. I don’t recall the woman’s name, but basically she retroactively fixed an accounting problem we’d been having. One TiVo in my name and one TiVo in Jenn’s name meant we’d been missing out on the multiple unit rate of $6.95 for additional TiVos (TiVoes?) past the first. Needless to say, we got some money back on the credit card in that instance as well.

Two lessons:

  1. If you’re a customer service person, giving folks money makes them happy
  2. Not always possible, financially responsible or feasible but that doesn’t make it any less true.

  3. TiVo wants to treat you well and does just that
  4. Both of my experiences were with courteous folks who listened first and actively sought out their superiors/managers before I had to ask. They wanted to make me happy and they succeeded.

Long story short: I’m sticking with TiVo for a while. They’ve treated me right and I totally adore their product, so I’m pretty much a complete mouthpiece for their service.

Vivo TiVo!

3 thoughts on “TiVo customer service rocks!

  1. I had a similar experience with ReplayTV. The first of the year the Sundance Channel fell out of the channle line up. I had just gotten hooked on Iconoclasts over the holidays, and then it was no gone from the guide.

    A call to customer service got me a human in Texas who walked my through the process of requesting the channel be added back to the lineup. 48 hours later, and it was there.

    What a joy when customer service really services the customer…

  2. Robert says:

    I’ve been on hold over 109 minutes at the time of this message. Linda answered at 60 minutes and placed me on hold. she then transferred me after I asked her not to. THis is the worst customer service I have ever received.

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