Why does customer service for business suck so damn hard?

[regexcellent]

You have to remember that a lot of vendors have high markups on their price sheets but generally give everyone discounts. For instance, we buy a lot of field testing equipment like portable water quality meters, PIDs, dust monitors, etc... and it is very much like buying a car. At first they don't want to give you a price sheet, then they don't want to give you any discounts from their price sheet, and by the end you're buying a piece of equipment for 30%-40% off of the price listed on their official price sheet.

Yeah this is exactly what is happening. The infuriating part is that it means it takes me a lot of effort to estimate costs and shop around.

God bless minimum wage, eh?

I have never been paid minimum wage in my life. My first job when I was 15 paid considerably more than it.

When I worked for the government I had to get three quotes for anything I wanted to buy, and then the person in charge of buying stuff would just go ahead and buy the stuff from whoever they wanted to (for at least 200% of the cost of the best quote I got)

This was pretty true at the Fed too. I wasn't responsible for buying stuff there, but basically nobody gave a damn about how much things cost. When we needed to destroy data from laptops, we'd chuck the whole thing into a huge industrial shredder and buy a new one. I doubt we ever asked for discounts.

[The Mad Monk]

Is that what happened to those IRS drives?

[Sava]

Is that what happened to those IRS drives?

and the porno from benghazi

[The Mad Monk]

Hey remember when the government blamed it on that poorly made anti islamic video? and they got the producer arrested? and it all got swept under the rug later?

[-Jrabbit]

Reg, you're doing (what should be) someone else's job. Doesn't your employer have a purchasing dept? If they have a dozen locations for you to network this summer, they should damn well have someone on staff whose job it is to deal with buying stuff in a reliably cost-effective manner.

It is a good skill to develop, true. But they are taking advantage of you a bit.

[Sava]

Hey remember when the government blamed it on that poorly made anti islamic video? and they got the producer arrested? and it all got swept under the rug later?

Be sure to make that the primary talking point in 2016.

[Sava]

BTW, I love the whole "hey, corporations aren't as super-efficient as I thought they were" thread.

Our little reg is growing up.

[The Mad Monk]

Oh, and Reg? Wait until you have to schedule a truck.

[MRT144]

Reg, you're doing (what should be) someone else's job. Doesn't your employer have a purchasing dept? If they have a dozen locations for you to network this summer, they should damn well have someone on staff whose job it is to deal with buying stuff in a reliably cost-effective manner.

It is a good skill to develop, true. But they are taking advantage of you a bit.

Yeah, if this was like my employer, a 65 person non profit, there might not be that buyer - I'd love it if Reg was being duped into doing 2-3 jobs and getting paid less than he should and he's still happy as a clam.

[The Mad Monk]

Don't you get it? Reg is the purchasing dept.

[MRT144]

If only so we could see him predictably say "I'm over worked and under paid, and I don't complain, all those burger flippers can just git out."

[Sava]

All those losers should just get a set of rich parents to provide them with every opportunity in life.

[The Mad Monk]

Rockin' that Hikikomori lifestyle

[Sava]

Rockin' that Hikikomori lifestyle

(just curious, is this a shaming attempt?)

[The Mad Monk]

No, it's a mocking attempt.