As Customer Problems Hit a Record High, More People Seek Revenge – WSJ

The percentage of consumers who have taken action to settle a score against a company through measures such as pestering or public shaming in person or online, has tripled to 9% from 3% in 2020, according to the study. That reversed a downward trend with regards to revenge-seeking behavior: The average percentage of customers seeking revenge between 2003 and 2017 was 17%. 

It s the idea of, if you as a company don t really seem to care, well then I m going to take to the streets, said Scott Broetzmann, president and chief executive of Customer Care Measurement & Consulting, which conducts the so-called National Customer Rage Survey with the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. The research, which builds on a study first conducted by the White House in 1976, albeit under a different name, found that 32% of complainants posted about their most serious problem on social media more than double the proportion who did so in the 2020 study.

Most people now are using a computer, they re using some form of social media at this point, there s a democratization of complaining, Mr. Broetzmann said.

But the results echo findings from consulting firm Forrester last year suggesting that the quality of customer experience offered by consumer-facing brands and government agencies declined in the year through April 2022. Forrester said its research studies 96,211 U.S. consumers perceptions of 221 organizations. 

via www.wsj.com

Revenge. Any good revenge stories out there? I usually just figure — oh well, and don’t use whoever it is again. I did suffer a really financially painful episode which I will not describe in which I was defrauded out of a large amount. I called the appropriate law enforcement authority and got some but not all of the money back. The defrauding party it turned out maintained a stable of lawyers to personally attack anyone who complained of being defrauded, which is presumably why they are still around and have such good ratings on the web. So it was tit for tat for tit. I guess I was sort of immune having already been fleeced and gone to the cops, but I decided to push my luck. Caveat emptor.