How much empathy is enough?

My family has a monthly-membership with an internet consumer company. It’s been more than 4 years we have been paying monthly for their services using a credit card. Today, on the payment date, they sent an e-mail saying they were unable to process the credit card because of expiry date issue and asking to update the payment information. I was surprised as the credit card expiry is mid next year and they have successfully charged me on the same credit card for as long as I remember. Instead of guessing, I decided to check-out the account details. What I saw was, the card on their record showed my name correct but with an unknown card number with expiry two years back!!

It did not make sense.

The thought of talking to support folks over this issue gave me shivers and I thought, let me correct the payment information to fix the problem.

When I tried providing the correct credit card details, their system failed with an useless message “There is a problem processing your credit card”. I tried but only to see the same message again. I went to Amazon and ordered the item that was lying in the cart to check if the card works; and it did. It was confirmed that my card has no issues at all. I saw no option ahead of me but to contact the support.

I wrote down the whole problem as precisely as possible before reaching out.

Support Person: Thank you for contacting, please provide me your email address.

Me: <provided my email address>

Support Person: Can I please put you on hold for a couple of minutes?

(Wouldn’t it be better if you would at least listen to my problem first?)
Me: Sure

(After around 30 seconds)
Support Person: Thanks for being patient. How may I help you?

(Copied the content that I had already kept typed)
Me: Hi, here is the problem:

Me: (1) I see that the payment information in my account has got changed for some unknown reason — mostly something on your system side. I was using a credit card for monthly payments which worked for last few years until today. The current card information it shows there isn’t my card. Your system shows an unknown card in my account which has an expiry date 2 years back and that’s why the payment processing has stopped working.

Me: (2) I received an email from you asking to update the payment info with a valid card. I tried replacing the erroneous card with my valid card against which you have always charged me but your system is just not accepting any card and keeps throwing an error message “There is a problem processing your credit card”.

Support Person: Sorry to hear that. Let me quickly check your account info.

(After another 30–45 seconds)
Support Person: I see that we are unable to collect the charge on your credit card.

(You are just repeating what I told you. And completely overlooked my first point. I bet, you didn’t even read anything I typed.)
Me: Thanks for understanding. My first question is — why is your system showing a card in my account which doesn’t even belong to me?

Support Person: Sorry to hear that. Do you have another card we can use?

(Shucks! Answer my question, please!)
Me: I don’t think you are listening. I want to understand how the credit card on my account got changed to the one that I don’t own. You have been charging me every month on a card that’s valid till next year; you can check the previous payment records. If it has worked so far, it should work now as well.

Support Person: We are not allowed to access customer transactions so I will not be able to do that. The card must have got updated from your side as we don’t change customer payment info.

(I’m holding my nerves with best possible efforts. Empathy. Empathy.)
Me: Let’s assume that I am stupid enough to enter a credit card that doesn’t belong to me, but tell me, will your system allow me to enter a credit card that has expiry 2 years back? Will it accept?

Support Person: All I can say at this moment is we don’t change customer payment info.

(Total surrender. Moving on.)
Me: Fine. I’ve tried entering a valid credit card but your system keeps throwing an error “There is a problem processing your credit card”. Can you please help me with that?

Support Person: I see. Can you please tell me the error message?

(What??? I just told you exactly that. Ooohmmm!!)
Me: The error message reads “There is a problem processing your credit card”

Support Person: Here is what I will do. I will send you a link where you can update the payment information.

(No! No!! No!!! I know how and where to do that. I told you multiple times, I already tried updating the payment information…. Long breath. Empathy! Empathy!!)
Me: I’ve already tried that, it fails, I told you.

(But I receive the link anyway)
Me: Fine. Let me try it one more time.

Support Person: I will wait.

(Thanks a ton! I try one more time and the system shows the same error message; it just wouldn’t accept a new card.)
Me: No, doesn’t allow me to update. Still fails with the same error message.

Support Person: You will have to contact your bank.

Me: I just used that card to make an online purchase to ensure if the card works and it did work without any issues. I know for sure that the card is working fine.

Support Person: A valid card must work with our system. You will have to contact your bank.

(I lose it)
Me: See, the first problem — I did not update the card because your system technically cannot accept a card that’s expired 2 years back. You’ve been charging me on the same card every month for last 4 years. Secondly, the card is just fine. It must be something with your system. Can you at least raise a ticket or escalate this issue to the technical department?

Support Person: It would be best you have to talk to your bank about this.

(Ah! God, mercy!)
Me: I’ve been your customer for last 4 years. This type of support seems unfair. Being an employee, you should at least be able to check previous records and if you’re not an employee, you should at least escalate this to the right department.

Support Person: The best thing you can do is contact your financial institution.

Me: Fine. Good bye.

No logical reasoning, no amount of empathy is sufficient to pull through such interactions.

In another similar incident, I received a message from my car insurance company about a newly issued policy. The policy copy was ready for download. They sent me the policy number and asked me to download the copy from their website but without providing the exact web-page address or link to download from. Website navigation design is what I do for living. So I know how the business websites are designed, how many designers really care about navigation and content organization, how many of them really have the skills and how mistakes happen. After 30 minutes of searching my way on their website, I gave up. Shivers up my spine, I pushed myself to press the “Live Chat” icon. A form popped up asking for name, email, phone, policy number. Each field mandatory!

Once I submitted it, the system connected me through. The support person began — “Thanks for contacting. Can you please give me your email address and policy number?”

Really? I already provided all that and more before I arrived here.

I anyway provided that information again. After that it was a torture of 20 minutes! Finally, I had to drop out of the chat without the only thing I wanted, the ‘download policy link’.

Had these incidents happened with my friend or unknown people, my response would be “Take it easy. It’s ok. May be you just had a bad day. And see, there is another side of the story, too. These support people have to continuously deal with horrible and unreasonable customers all day long. It is not an easy job.” To that alter ego, I feel like telling, “Is that the license to screw others? But hold on, being a support person, it is your job to listen, understand and respond. Both the above incidents were online chat support conversations. It was not like, I was shouting at them in person or even over phone. That leaves them with an easy responsibility of reading what the customer is saying and they weren’t doing that.”

It is very easy to show “unnecessary” empathy, especially when “we are not involved”.

On a routine basis we all have to deal with irrationality, injustice and stupidity. The common consistent pattern is, agitated reaction when it happens to you and empathy for the wrong doer when it happen to others.

Yet, punishment is no solution for a wrong doing and at the same time, empathy during frustration is also not practical. When I am left alone to feel the wrong doing, no ‘show some empathy’ advice is ever going to work.

I must stop looking outside and do some soul-searching to find the answers.

Stoicism shows us a possible path.

At least on a regular basis, humans are more sensitive to “emotional feelings” than other species. We pay a lot of attention to ‘how we feel’ rather than ‘how things actually are’. Feelings are subjective. An incident or a story generates unique responses from all individuals. When a beloved king who has been worshiped for life by his people gets killed in a war, one people grieved deeply and the other celebrated. Which side is right?

There have been number of mass extinction events on earth to make humans rule this planet today. Many species had to die for no fault of theirs. What is the quality of life of the domesticated animals that support human societies? Chicken, goats, pigs, cows and more. Many of them live in horrible conditions during their short lives just to end up cut into pieces and then steamed, roasted or fried. Yet more and more of them are born to create bigger vicious cycles. One day, the life on earth and the earth itself will vanish. It is hard to find the rightness and wrongness about something or someone — it is always going to be the perspective which will make that decision.

There is no such thing as justice.

Only humans have perspectives and only humans worry about justice. In reality, justice doesn’t exist. Things are the way they are!

It is better to take things lightly, especially when negativity is about to rise.

Here is what I did after the above frustrating experiences. I reopened an account with the same company using another e-mail address but using the same old credit card and started using their services again in less than five minutes. It worked. I did not want to spend more energy to build further negativity around a senseless support act.

In the car insurance case, I found the policy download link on a user forum.

No amount of empathy is enough when you need it for others. Better, empathize with yourself!