United Refrigeration

Just had, what has to be, one of my worst customer interactions yet.

We drop our previous load at another customer in town. Pick up our empty. Drive 30 miles to the next shipper , they are cool, if a bit disorganized. We arrive, and leave there well ahead of schedule. Then we hit Dallas/Ft Worth construction traffic on the way to our first stop, meaning we are only about 15 minutes early to our appointment.

Receiver decides today is a good day to die. He claims we are two hours late (we aren't) and that we can't get unloaded here, but instead must be escorted to another building to be unloaded there. So we sit for nearly an hour. Finally another worker leads us one building away. First dude couldn't just tell us that. So we back in and get unloaded.

I realize that doesn't sound too bad, but that's because I am self-censoring so Brett doesn't have to delete my entire thread. The way this guy treated us was ridiculous. He's lucky I have a head for customer service (and keeping my job) rather than pulling him through his little window and shoving his vape stick where the sun don't shine.

I honestly don't see any problem here. Maybe you're just looking for things to complain about? Haha kidding!

A lot of times there's some miscommunication between the consignee and the Customer Service team. As a result, the consignee wants you there at 0800 but your company accidentally messed up and wrote you up for 1000. It happens. So this could easily be anyone's fault.

Also, lots of businesses own several buildings in the same block. Building A is for Dry Goods Distributing, building B is for Reefer Distributing, building C is for office employees. That's just an example obviously. But them directing you to a different building definitely isn't uncommon and really shouldn't be a big deal.

Also, lots of places require the driver to have an escort. There could be a million reasons for this but safety is usually the key factor. They don't want some guy driving around and getting lost possibly, getting into places he shouldn't be and maybe damaging something extremely dangerous/valuable.

Listen, you're going to have a good chunk of facilities that treat the drivers unfairly. That's why we say that drivers have no control, they're the lowest on the totem pole. We depend on others so that we can do our job. However, you cannot let them get under your skin or else you'll die of a heart attack at age 30.

You're right. I've never come across customers who've done this before. I'm completely overreacting over a customer who was actually a joy to deal with.

Or, maybe I know what that grade-A ******bag actually acted like. This guy is lucky I'm a company driver, and therefore restricted in the kinds of response I can give.

Luckily I'm already 34 so I've beaten the odds.

The guy was a tool. He started by going all passive aggressive on me: "You're late. Where you been? Sleeping?" I gave him the raised eyebrow...yeah, tool is as far as I'll go. My response was "I'm not late, we Te scheduled for 1:15. And, I just picked up your trailer an hour ago and have been sitting in traffic on I35W for the last 30 minutes".