It is Friday and Fridays are for fun. Each day is National Something Day. Today happens to be national vodka day and it is also national cinnamon roll day. It is national truck drivers day and national bring your bible to school day. It is also improve your office day. I like to pick and choose what I celebrate. I’ll need some vodka today.
If you feel like celebrating something just ask Google what is being celebrated today.
It is Friday and Fridays are for fun. I sold my car with a Minnesota State Park sticker that is good until May 2025. I never used the
sticker which is alright. It was an aspirational state park sticker.
I feel the same way about my passport which is good until April 2027 and my TSA pre-check which is good until sometime in 2028, and hasn’t been used since I renewed it last year. I aspire to use them both.
We all need hopes, dreams, and goals.
It is Friday and Fridays are for fun. I remember when I went away to college. There was no internet, facetime or cell phones. Maybe there were “car phones” but the average family did not own one.
Most of our parents were not “snow plow” parents. We had to deal with our own stuff and while away at college if we wanted to talk to the folks we used the one shared phone in the phone room in our dormitory. There was one phone on each floor.
When parents called if someone answered they had to find us. Sometimes they just stood in the hallway and yelled. When something went wrong we had to handle it ourselves. In fact, as a young adult, I took pride in being able to manage my life without help from mommy and daddy.
Times have changed. College students and their parents keep in touch with each other with daily calls, text messages, and video chats. I feel lucky to have experienced college the way that I did. I graduated and was ready for adulting.
I also experienced this as a parent when my daughter taught in France for a school year. Our only communication was via email and a long-distance calling card. Sometimes I worried but I knew she could do it and she did.
It is Friday and Fridays are for fun. Summer isn’t over, we have a few more weeks. Enjoy the last weekend of August and the Labor Day holiday.
It is Friday and Fridays are for fun. A couple of years ago I wrote a post about customer service, and I wrote it on a Friday even though Fridays are for fun and customer service is never fun. It used to be about pressing #1 for sales or #6 for support and being put on hold. Have you ever noticed that talking to a sales representative is almost always the first menu option?
Customer service has not changed much but now they have added a new feature the customer service survey. It isn’t all that new but we can count on a survey from just about every company we hire to provide a service. In fact, even getting an estimate will result in a survey.
If the plumber fixes the leak that we called him to fix we pay him but he expects more. We need to fill out a survey and rate his work. If he did what he was hired to do we are supposed to give him a five-star rating.
If you go to a doctor or dentist you will be asked to fill out a survey, before the appointment and after the appointment. To be fair the survey before the appointment asks the same stupid questions you may have answered a week ago.
Most surveys don’t have any questions that I would like to answer. They may ask me to rate the person who answered the phone. They never ask me to rate their surveys.
This week I called for estimates on some work I need on the house. In one case I got the satisfaction survey before I got the estimate. If I call someone and ask for an estimate and they come out and look at my project they send a survey. When I set up the appointment I told them I don’t do surveys. They sent one anyway.
Going forward I am going to tell service providers that there will be a survey surcharge of $100 and by sending me a survey they have agreed to pay it. I’ll put this information at the bottom of every email or online form I fill out for service. Even if they send $100 I am not going to fill out the survey.
It is Friday and Fridays are for fun. I get many emails that I didn’t ask for and don’t want. There are the scammers who tell me they have access to my computer and they want money. I report the email as a scam and delete it. Royalty in several countries have my email address and they want to send me millions if I would just give them my banking info. I report and delete.
Worse, are the people who send me emails because they want to sell me something. They send an email and when they don’t get a response they “circle back” asking for a response. They beg and plead, yet I don’t send a response.
The truth about email is that we don’t owe anyone an answer just because they sent an email. Even in Minnesota, we don’t have to be “nice” and respond. As a business owner, I don’t have any special obligation to respond to an email from another business. I honor my commitment to respond to emails from clients and people that I work with.
Have a great weekend!