Did anyone replace Helen Oster at Adorama?

I've bought from B&H Photo and Adorama in the past as well as KEH and MPB. After reading the posting about how Helen was treated, Adorama is off the list. The a7r and Sigma 105 1.4 I just bought came from B&H Photo in part because of this thread. I hardly believe the way Helen was treated is an isolated incident and have seen that type of behavior of looking down at the customer service, HR people or regular employees while viewing them as a necessary evil. I put a manager and a company on notice once after hearing how they were trying to intimidate by shouting and coming up to an employee with a hammer. They knew they could get away with it due to who the person was, until I made them aware I was more than willing to follow through with a harassment lawsuit on the employees behalf. Letting them know that others in the company were willing to file as well made upper management, which included the President of the company begin to take seriously the need to change the bullying culture within the company.

john crossley wrote in post #18921310
I’ve got to be honest, I don’t understand why a company wants or feels the need for an employee to have a presence on an internet forum. As far as I am aware it doesn’t happen in the UK. Maybe it’s just an American thing.

I am guessing that there is *inherently* more consumer protection offered to customers in the UK, than inherently exist for consumers in the US.
We have little recourse by law...It is simply 'goodwill' that causes retailers to offer any refund time period! About the only expectation one has is that the product is not defective out of the box, wherein normal business practice is to exchange the defective unit for a non-defective one.

NDAPhoto wrote in post #18921170
Welcome. Since I started this thread, you can start by responding to my initial topic. Why do you have such aggressive tracking practices on the website? Why did your customer service staff give me a take-it-or-leave-it attitude? I was already signed up for weekly email and I don’t want more. When I visit the site, I don’t want a follow up message telling me every damn time that I’m missing out, or to hurry up before they’re gone. That’s intrusive and inconsiderate as I may just be verifying a spec for a product I already own, or passing the info to a student. It certainly doesn’t prompt me to buy anything. In fact it has the opposite effect. I haven’t bought anything from Adorama ever since. When I specifically choose to accept weekly email, it doesn’t mean I want you to contact me daily.

Under Helen, Adorama gained thousands of dollars in sales from me each year. I had consciously shifted my purchases from your biggest competitor and also from a startup broker. I was a frequent VIP customer and had two accounts. Mostly because I believed there was an ethical component along with efficiency as a result of Helen’s activity here and direct handling of two situations for me. If you read this thread thoroughly, you have already found it has all been eroded. Not a strike against you personally, but I attribute it directly to poor decision makers at Adorama. When they don’t care about ethics, customers don’t care about you.

As to the manner in which employees are treated... my comments would not be allowed here. Have your CEO PM me instead.

First, I'd like to thank you for your loyalty throughout the years and I’m looking forward to being here for you with any assistance you may need with your Adorama purchases.

I apologize for the experience you had with our customer service team. I hope you understand that it does not reflect the standard of service to customers we expect from our team members. I would greatly appreciate it if you could email me more information on the interaction so I can look into this further. My email address is nancym@adorama.com

With regard to your feedback about the marketing emails and the website tracking, I very much appreciate your feedback on this and I'll get this escalated to our IT and marketing teams, please email me your phone number and best time to reach you so we can follow up with you to discuss this complaint.

I will welcome you here to POTN, Nancy.

But if I may, and with all due respect, I would suggest you be more transparent around here.

If you will understand, your predecessor discovered and invited discussions right here
in the forum about issues raised. Such an approach afforded everyone here an understanding
of issues at hand, as well as providing some insight about the communications which
would then follow. These exchanges offered many whom were not involved in the issue
to garner great respect for Ms. Oster in her communications and dealings with people,
resulting in positive outcomes in most instances, which became common under Ms. Oster's
heading of customer relations.

Having offered the above, I would be forced to admit that your response to NDAphoto
reads like a typical script-form reply so commonly given by 'support' personnel worldwide,
who are directed to respond ONLY according to a script, regardless of actual information provided.

You nailed it. While I hold no grudges against the new Adorama representative I couldn't help but feel the scripted response myself. My beefs with Adorama often came from dealing with the used department and Helen was right on top of getting me the info I requested to make the purchase.

Before I bought my Pentax 645D which was $2000 at the time I couldn't get photos of it and another from the used department. I remember getting emails from Helen around 2 or 3 am offering assistance in acquiring the photo's and reassuring me that she would look into the delay in processing my request.

Helen not only was able to quickly get the issue solved but was able to give me a detailed explanation of how and why it happened. That is service I remember and honor with future purchases.

Wilt wrote in post #18921358
I am guessing that there is *inherently* more consumer protection offered to customers in the UK, than inherently exist for consumers in the US.
We have little recourse by law...It is simply 'goodwill' that causes retailers to offer any refund time period! About the only expectation one has is that the product is not defective out of the box, wherein normal business practice is to exchange the defective unit for a non-defective one.

Yes, I also believe this holds true.

The EU countries generally have far higher consumer-protection policies in place,
while the US lags behind in many areas, as my understanding goes.

Thus is why it makes solid sense for a service representative to maintain good relations
with customers in the US, as it often can be a deal-breaker if we can't get resolution
to seemingly trivial and major problematic issues.

Somebody stepping into a new role will often be provided or will create a script to follow for various things, until the experience with the customer base reaches a point where the script will be thrown out. Just need a bit more time, let's see how it goes.

john crossley wrote in post #18921310
I’ve got to be honest, I don’t understand why a company wants or feels the need for an employee to have a presence on an internet forum. As far as I am aware it doesn’t happen in the UK. Maybe it’s just an American thing.

It depends on the field, maybe.
Here's a UK company that has a presence in various social media:
https://syrris.com/con​tact-us/

https://blog.syrris.co​m/
https://www.youtube.co​m/watch?v=LkZ9zt3zwz4
https://www.facebook.c​om/syrrisltd/
https://www.linkedin.c​om …ia-flow-chemistry-system/

Forums such as this have been greatly supplanted by Facebook or other ways to communicate. There is much material for flow chemistry on ResearchGate, wher ethe questions are answered on an individual basis.

I don't have any specific knowledge regarding Helen and Adorama beyond what is posted here, but I will say that it hardly surprises me. Not because I know or think that those running Adorama are heartless bastards, but because this is precisely what I've seen many US companies do time and time again. Instead of rewarding the best and most committed employees, those folks are often run into the ground precisely because they are willing to go above and beyond.

Profit is king/greed is good. Blame Milton Friedman, I guess.

I certainly feel for Helen, and for Nancy, having to fill huge shoes and likely not getting very much internal support.

Adorama went through a couple executive level changes in the past 3 years, and as many of us know, those can be good changes, or really bad changes.

Hunter Harrison was a prime example. Only the bottom dollar was considered so many people became expendable as a result at each RR he went to. Shareholders want one thing only. Others make changes with more of a customer and employee approach, while trying to keep the shareholders more level set.

Anyone thinking scripted messages are indicative of corporate response or a lack of transparency is probably correct.

1. I sent a 680-word message to Nancy about my experience and complaint over Adorama’s aggressive tracking and email practice. I said the praise here for Helen was genuine, but beside the point. My email and phone were included and they have my account info.

2. I received a reply thanking me for my “Passionate and valuable feedback”. ”We are taking this seriously” and ”We’d like to schedule a follow-up call with you to discuss this further.” No direct recognition or comment about the problem itself.

3. This is after I complained by chat and phone weeks ago resulting in a customer service rep removing me from all email. I pointed out the irony of seeking more contact for a complaint about intrusiveness, and I agreed they can call me so long as she understood I would describe it on POTN.

4. Nancy replied, “We understand and respect your wishes regarding any further contact and won't contact you anymore.”

Nancy, I wanted someone to address inappropriate website tracking and emails. You jumped into this thread in reaction to other member’s piling on with negative comments about Adorama. You wanted to move the discussion offline rather than address it here. I just returned from trips to 3 states in 4 weeks, so don’t have time for all the back and forth without any correction.

So you are getting the feeling this is the case for now?

Automated platitudes are annoying, but the use of the “royal we” probably sums it up.

I won’t add negative personal remarks because there is probably a real person trying to do a job. It’s the corporate culture that makes such a job empty and keeps the person powerless to solve problems.

Nobody is making any personal negative remarks, of course there is a real person, she has been making her way around the forums. One has to have a bit of humor around this though.

The graphic, designed to be funny and not to be negative, does present the situation though that if the corporate directive is to follow a script each and every time an issue arises, then it doesn't matter if there is a person there or not, the end result is an automated one. A person can act robotically and I daresay all of us, at one time or another, have responded to another in this manner.

I wasn’t implying the cartoon was a negative personal remark. I meant I was withholding my own negative remarks. POTN members can have at it. Or we can speculate how this would have been handled far better by a certain person if still employed in the industry.