Bingo supplies is like every other business in at least one way. You can't please every customer all of the time. This proved true again recently as our staff dealt with a customer who, to put it plainly, over-estimated her value as a customer.
 
I'll call this particular customer "Jane". Jane first ordered from Wholesale Bingo Supplies approximately a month ago. It was a small order (which is fine, we love orders of all sizes) for some $9.95 bingo paper , but it was an order I normally wouldn't see or remember. I happened to remember this order because she asked to use her own FedEx shipping number after she had already been billed and charged. Apparently, she could save herself $0.50, or so.
 
So, we said "no problem" (even though it was a bit of a hassle for us),  cancelled her original order, notified our warehouse, refunded her order, charged her again without the freight, and then requested that our warehouse manager arrange for a FedEx pickup of her shipment using her shipper ID. These are things we do in the normal course of business every day, but for an order this small, we lose money because ot the time involved. The total time these steps take is probably around 15-30 minutes, and the profit we see on an order like this is probably $2.00. In fact, because this order was a loser for us, we decided after the order was shipped, to change our policy and only allow customers to use their own shipper on orders over $50.00. Which brings us to yesterday....
 
Jane calls Wholesale Bingo Supplies again and is upset. She received her order and (I'm paraphrasing) "it was the worst bingo game paper she had ever seen". She had "handed the paper out to her players and they had trouble playing on it because it would bend as they played". Now, let me pause this story here and explain to you a little bit about the bingo paper we carry.
 
In the bingo industry, there are 3 major manufacturers of bingo game paper in the US that sell bingo paper which winds up in casinos, tribal casinos, commercial bingo halls, charity bingos, etc. All 3 manufacture high quality, commercial grade bingo paper, and Wholesale Bingo Supplies carries all 3 brands. This means we carry the highest quality bingo paper on the market.
 
Could someone still get some bad bingo paper from us? Sure. Manufacturing errors occur, shipping damage happens, etc., but most of the time, our customers are going to receive the highest quality bingo paper in the industry. However, if someone receives a bad product from us, send it back, and we'll refund your money. Now, back to Jane.....
 
So, Jane says the bingo paper we sent her was horrible. She wants a full refund, but she's willing to order more paper (a different style), only she wants us to ship this bingo paper to her without any shipping charges because, "our shipping charges are too high". Did I mention we're in Michigan and she's in California, and that paper is a heavy product and costs a lot to ship, and that we get our shipping charges directly from UPS? Did I mention that Jane is also being extremely rude to some of the nicest ladies you'll ever meet in our front office?
 
Now, normally we'd give Jane a full refund if she ships the product back to us, but she used up a lot of it and is unwilling to pay to have it shipped back. So, at this point, with the complaining, the unrealistic expectations, the unrealistic idea of costs involved and the importance of her order, we basically tell Jane that we're sorry, we can't help her. That's not good enough. Jane wants to speak to the owners.
 
Did I mention that Jane now has been complaining for about 30 minutes on the phone? At this point, I tell our front office to quit wasting their time and to let Jane know that there's nothing more we can do and talking to the owners isn't going to help. Our front office apologizes again and Jane hangs up , but not before telling us that she's going to spread the word about our bad service and that she knows a lot of people in the bingo industry.

Good grief. I wish you the best Jane.