Please Listen Carefully, As Our Menu Options Have Recently Changed.

I had to call a bank to get their routing number for a client. I don’t remember why, but I remember the phone call.

Some 800 number that didn’t actually ring, but picked up immediately and the voice started talking at me.

Thank you for calling Bank We Love You!!! (not the actual name), your call may be recorded for training purposes. Please listen carefully, as our menu options have recently changed.

Recently?

I felt like Inigo Montoya from The Princess Bride…

“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

Now, when I looked up on Dictionary.com this morning, here is the definition of the word Recent:

adjective

1 — of late occurrence, appearance, or origin; lately happening, done, made, etc.:recent events; a recent trip.

2 — not long past:in recent years.

So maaaybe, if you are counting definition #2, “recent years”, they may be using the word correctly. If it’s a company 100 years old, and they last changed the options in 2001, I suppose on that scale it might technically be considered recent.

Getting by on a technicality…

Right after I got off the phone with the bank, whose name I can’t remember, nor can I remember the name of the person I actually spoke with, I called Phillip. My banker.

Two rings, and he picked up the phone.

I didn’t actually have a question, I just needed to feel like I was actually a human being again, not merely an inbound call that was cheaper to handle with a “for checking, press 1” question.

In the quest for cutting costs, the systems put into place have cost something far greater than money. Relationships.

As my computer mentor back in the day would say, “Penny smart and dollar foolish.”

Now, I get it, companies that don’t watch costs will open themselves up to spending themselves into failure. But companies that don’t value relationships will find that their clients will find companies that do.

Be careful how you define ‘recently.’ It may not mean what you think it means.