Catalogs

6 Comments

I mentioned a month ago that the previous residents of my new place were catalog shoppers. I hadn't realized quite how true that was. There've been at least thirty new catalogs in the past month; I think that's actually just in the past two weeks, but I'm not sure of that. So I've been calling to be removed from mailing lists again.

It's interesting to see how many variations there are on phone systems for handling this stuff. Sometimes I call and immediately get a person; sometimes I go into a "please continue to hold" queue; most often there's a phone tree. Sometimes the phone tree even has an option specifically for being removed from the mailing list.

After a human comes on the line, I briefly explain the situation—I would just say I wanted to be removed from their mailing list, but then they wonder why someone with a clearly female first name has a baritone voice, and I figure there's no harm in explaining at the start. Sometimes they ask for a customer number; sometimes they ask for a name. I'm always dubious when they ask for a name and address; there are so many different ways of storing that data, and it's so easy to misspell things (even though I spell everything carefully for them), that I wouldn't be surprised if half the time the name isn't actually being removed from the list. Especially since I suspect if there's no customer number they don't actually have her info in a database; I'm guessing (with no evidence at all) that if there's no customer number, they got her name from some other mailing list.

Most of the representatives tell me at the end of the call that they have to warn me that there'll probably be two or three more catalogs before they stop coming. I think they're relieved when I make clear that I understand and am expecting that; I imagine some customers make a big fuss about it.

Sometimes they say some variant on "You have a good night" when the call is over. I like that (and I always say "You, too"). I think my reaction stems partly from so many years of awful interactions with customer service people, especially on the phone—if I can get through a call like this with everyone remaining cheerful and friendly, it's a big relief.

6 Responses to “Catalogs”

  1. CathEmery

    What’s fun about saying “You, too” is how often the people I say it to look surprised and pleased.

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  2. Will

    I have just the opposite reaction to “catalogs delivered to former occupants of my apartment”: I love them. It means I get to look at glossy pictures of things for free without expending any effort or giving out my name and address. Lots of the things I’m not interested in specifically, but the catalogs are always interesting anyhow, and sometimes they’re particularly cool (LEGO Shop@Home).

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  3. Jed

    I can see finding them interesting or fun, but I already get more junk mail than I want. And catalogs self-proliferate—if you’re on a list, you’re likely to be put on more lists. I should probably send the previous resident’s name, with my new address, to the Direct Marketing Association to avoid further proliferation.

    I think it’s also a shopping-style thing for me. I buy stuff online all the time, but I almost never buy anything from catalogs per se. And I don’t even like getting catalogs from companies I do buy from—I know they’re out there, I can find what I need at any time on their websites, I don’t want all that wasted paper coming to my door every month.

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  4. Heather Shaw

    Speaking as someone who both puts people on and takes people off a mailing list during the course of my workday, not having a customer number doesn’t necessarily mean they bought the address from someone else. We used to use customer numbers here at work, but got rid of them — too many people lost them and just opened a new account, leading to lots of duplicate info in the system. Looking someone up by name and/ or address is usually more effective — you can confirm the data in the system with the person on the phone to make sure you’ve got the same person. Sometimes people will have moved, but we can usually figure that out if we can’t find them for some reason.

    Some folks do get really testy with you when you tell them they might get another catalog or two. Catalogs generally go out via bulk mail, which honestly takes forever, so often there’s one meandering its way to the customer when they call to be removed from the list.

    I love nice customers so much! I’m not surprised you’re one yourself, but thanks for being nice to these people anyway 🙂 One friendly phone call from a customer can really brighten a dreary workday.

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  5. Jed

    Thanks, Heather! In the interests of full disclosure, I should note that I’m not always a nice customer; there’ve been too many times in the past when I’ve gotten into furious shouting matches with customer service people over various things that I perceive as idiotic policies and they see as just doing their job. But I’m trying harder these days, both for their sake and, honestly, for my own; I hate it when things get to that point.

    As for customer numbers, glad to hear the lack of them doesn’t necessarily mean the person’s not on the list. But do your catalogs still have a blank space for customer number? The ones that worry me have a code number in the where-we-got-your-name box, but an empty customer-number box, especially when they ask for not just name but full address. Tends me make me think that rather than looking up the customer in their database, they’re just typing in the name and address on a “remove from mailings” list, suggesting that if the information doesn’t get written down exactly the way it appears on the catalog, the name won’t be removed. But again, I have no evidence here; just thinking about how a lazy programmer would implement this.

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  6. metasilk

    You might also send snips of the addresses (from the back covers) to the Direct Marketing Association, to decrease the proliferation rate new catalogs. YOu’re probably already watching for variations; I know my mom has some 15 variations of the name & address circulating these days.

    Check out this site for more:
    http://www.dmaconsumers.org/consumerassistance.html

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