Last night I had the pleasure of hanging out with a couple of good friends and enjoying some of the early Spring weather here in the Nutmeg State. As we were finishing up our meal, we decided that we should head back home and catch the Manny Pacquiao fight on Pay-Per-View. We arrived home just after 11pm, and still had about 20 minutes before the fight was scheduled to start. However, when we pulled up the fight on Cablevision the system told us the event was no longer available for purchase. A quick call to customer service confirmed — Cablevision wouldn’t let people purchase the fight after 11pm.
We were shocked. Here we were, sitting at home, ready to spend the $50 to watch the fight, and Cablevision wouldn’t let us order the fight. We did our best to negotiate with customer service, even making our way to a supervisor, but the answer was still the same: We will not let you order the fight. It didn’t matter if it was 1 minute, 1 hour, or 1 year after 11pm.
Now I’m sure Cablevision has some well reasoned argument for this decision, but how do you not let your customers pay for your product? Cablevision’s customers have myriad choices for how to spend their entertainment dollars, and Cablevision should be fighting for each and every transaction. Here was a situation where a customer desperately wanted to pay them $50, and Cablevision simply could not find a way to satisfy the customer. That, to me, is a business failure. This was a one-time event, so each customer that Cablevision declined to serve after 11pm represents $50 in revenue that Cablevision will never receive.
“Delight the Client” is an overused cliche, but the lesson behind it remains important.
-UM
P.S. In hindsight, maybe we’re glad that Cablevision didn’t let us pay $50 to watch 4 minutes of boxing, but I’d much rather have been given the chance to watch the fight live on TV.
