At this point in our story I got to work with one of the more helpful people at Polaroid (seriously, not sarcastically), supervisor Angel A. I explained everything to Mr. A who agreed that Polaroid should take care of the problem, but that he personally couldn’t do anything to resolve the issue since he no longer had any access to that model TV in his computer system. I told him that I understood and asked to speak with his supervisor, but was told that all supervisors above him were unavailable but that one would call me back the following Monday. Realizing that I was momentarily defeated I hung up and waited for the call.
As Monday afternoon turned to Monday evening I figured it was safe to assume that I would not be receiving a call from Angel A’s supervisor so I gave him a call back. Mr. A was, of course, unavailable, but he would return my call as soon as he finished the call he was on. Half an hour later I called back, asked to be moved to a supervisor immediately, upon talking to that person, asked to speak with their supervisor immediately, and so figured I was back to the level where I had left off on the previous Friday.
To make a long story a tiny bit shorter, I proceeded to speak with 5 more levels of “supervisors” before I was finally able to speak with the affable (sarcastically, not seriously) Diane. Diane was an interesting character, by this point in the proceedings I had already come to the conclusion that Polaroid had completely tied the hands of this call center and that there was nothing anyone there could do to help me (the several levels of “supervisors” between Mr. A and Diane had convinced me of this). I knew that I would need speak with someone at Polaroid corporate to get anything done, so when Diane answered I began by (again) explaining the situation to her as well as stating that I knew there was nothing she personally could do to resolve the situation, but that all I wanted from her was the name and phone number for someone at Polaroid corporate that could take up the problem.
Diane told me that she couldn’t provide that information so I provided her with the other option of letting me speak to her supervisor, as I had done for all those who came before her. I’ll let the rest of the conversation (to the best of my memory) speak for itself.
Diane: My manager doesn’t take any calls.
Zak: I understand, then can I have the name of someone else above you who would be willing to take a call?
Diane: There is no one else above me.
Zak: Alright, then let me have the number of the person I would talk to if I had a complaint about you. Not that I have a complaint now, but who would that person be.
Diane: If you don’t have a complaint about me I can’t give you that number.
Zak: Ok, well in that case I do have a complaint about you, who should I talk to?
Diane: I’m not going to give you that name or number. If you’re not happy with us you can research the number for the Polaroid Customer Care Center. But I won’t give out any names or number.
Zak: Great, I’d like the number for the Polaroid Customer Care Center
Diane: I’m not giving you any more information. Have a nice evening, sir.
At this point Diane hung up on me as she was apparently flustered at having accidentally revealed the existence of top secret Polaroid Customer Care Center line (1-800-232-5000 or 1-800-343-5000). I’ll get back to what happened after calling that number next time, but I did want to mention that Angel A eventually called me back that night about 4 hours after my initial call to him. I’m glad he did since Diane wouldn’t give me her name a second time (I hadn’t caught whether it was Diane or Diana).
