So a few days ago I logged into my clububt account and sent them an email from the site asking about the number of actual cruises they will be offering -- will it still be 104 or a lower number. No reply as of today. Looking back at my history of emails to the club, I found this: Reference number: LTK9204761038X Please use this ticket number in any correspondence with us. Subject: Customer Support Form Submission Dear Ted, Thank you for contacting us. I am not sure why your other contacts with us were not going through, but are glad that they finally did! I've checked your credit card history and see that on Sept 14 when we tried to settle the bank returned the error code: Creditcard Expiration Date is invalid (already expired). Expiration dates are not allowed to be stored by us in our system, so unfortunately I can't confirm what date was entered. Because the attempted charge failed, this cancelled your promo rate subscription. The history of these emails is as follows: 9-14-07: I get a "subscription payment failure" email 9-14-07: I reply to the email sent to me with: My credit card ending in 8590 is still a valid one. Do you have the expiration date as 08/10? I tried to correct this on your site, but the only option was to enter the credit card info again, but my original sign-up offer of $9.95 for the first six months was not available. Can you please renew my membership with this offer, using the above credit card? On 9-21-07: I send the same message above, stating that "I have still not received a reply to my email below." On 9-27-07: I decide to send them my message directly from their site. And they reply on the same day with the message at the top of this email. Now if I was a player who wasn't sure if they were going to continue their membership, when the above incident happened, I would have probably given up. So, one less paying customer for the club. Could I have been the only one this happened to? Doubt it. After all, credit cards expire all the time and new ones are issued with new expiration dates. And it also seems like there was a glitch with their customer service emails back in September. Maybe they were more focused on putting together those awesome commercials! But if their unoffficial spokesperson/investor simply wants to bury his head -- and his money -- in the sand, be my guest. And when he posts that "All emails that are actually sent are answered within 1 hour during normal office hours," does he mean ALL or just the ones he can verify? If he was a truly smart rep and investor, instead of attacking this email, he would take it to the powers-that-be at the club and launch an investigation into two things: 1. Review the reference number in the email above to find out if there truly was -- and still is -- a glitch in the system. 2. Talk to the customer service manager to find out if anything has been done -- or even can be done -- about members' credit cards expiring and having to send the members an automatic "Subscription Payment Failure" message. See, Mr. unofficial spokesperson, I've just thrown you two nuggets that could save you or make you some money. It will be interesting to see what you do with these nuggets: 1. Use these nuggets and actually thank me for pointing them out 2. Use them but won't acknowledge where the info came from 3. Simply ignore everything I've posted since I'm a pot-stirrer 4. Post that the club has already fixed the glitch with some email correspondence not getting through, and that the credit card expiration snafu has been fixed 5. Attack what I've pointed out because I'm a liar 6. Attack what I've said because I can't be right, and he and the club are NEVER wrong 7. Attack me for having the audacity to bring up something that hasn't worked-- and may still not work -- at the club So which will it be? Anyone want to take any bets? As I've said to him before, "Instead of biting off my (and everone else's) fingers, look to where they're pointing." In this case, and in toonces' case, and in fgk42's case, and in leftnut's case, and in barney's case, and in buckeyetodd's case, and in countless other recent cases, they're pointing to possible gold for the club. Actually, if he chooses anything but #1 above, the other nuggets I have to share, that will make or save hime money, will stay buried in the beautiful Florida sand. Let's see if he can get over his big ego for a change, and actually use and take valid information and ideas, that will not only help him, but all his colleagues at the club, and ultimately the 5,000 players (oh wait, 20,000 players as of two weeks from now) on the club. How much more could be gained for everyone involved, if he would simply act civil just once, and apologize just once, and not be ego-driven just once, and sit down and have a true conversation with the players who are trying to help him and the club succeed. Is that too foreign a concept to understand? teabird got it. We understand it. Probably even the other execs at the club would get it, if they only came on these forums and listened to what was saying without taking any negative comment as an attack that needed to be replied to in a nasty way. And since awhile back he gave me permission to post his PMs to me, I'll do so here, so he can remember what he once said and truly felt: On 9-6-07: Ted Sweettea and I are very happy that we have made peace as prior to all of this we have always be polite and cordial to eachother and our girlfreinds. Mutual respect might be a better way to put it. You have my permission to copy my reply and do with it as you see fit. And your last bet was a super bet and made me smile and say out loud the son of a gun can play. Continued success and I really look forward to spending quality time with you on the cruise and getting to know you better. After all you have to be a good guy, you and I are from the same core. Plus 2 Brooklyn boys in the long run will always have each others back. If I could ever be of any assistance to you please do not hestitate to ask.It would be my pleasure. JP And on 9-7-07: Ted in addition to the 3 scheduled tournaments there will also be sit & go's and 3 Poker tournaments. I also look forward to really developing a long term friendship with you beyond the internet. It should be a blast as I really need a vacation as i spend too much time in fron of the computer.Losing my people interaction skills. This way I can still play and talk to others just not over a keyboard. Take care my friend JP
Yet another home run from the guy in Naples. Kudos, Ted. Too bad nobody's listening - at least, nobody who could (and should) make use of such excellent suggestions and commentary.