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July 12, 2005
Visa Blog or, how not to treat a customer
There are companies that clearly don't show much respect for their customers. Companies, that really don't think that a voice can be amplified and is amplified in the blogger space.
I am talking about Visa, to be specific, Visa International. Many will remember that they ask the Visa Blog to give up his or her domain name.
And why not, do I ask - they are the owner of the brand name. Of coure, they are concerned that someone uses their name in one of the many subdomains available.
The only thing that matters here is actually, that they ask someone to give up the name, after he subscribed to the name, when they lapsed to extend their domain. That means, that they forgot to extend the name. Nevermind. It can still be handled in a nice way, also, of course, since, well, everybody can forget something.
But no way - I haven't seen the documents, but what Blewtooth, the guy owning the Malaysian visa domain writes, well, there is a clear signal that Visa doesn't want to play nicely.
Apparently, they responded to his inquiry with a strict no. A loud and noisy NO.
Like that:
"The legal advisors (yes, I've seen more than one of them) have also advised me that the best I could do is to ask for some compensations and give up the domain. So i did. I politely asked for compensation (of course I had to be careful for not falling into a 'cybersquatting' trap, if there's any), but all I asked for is a domain replacement so I can keep blogging and I don't think that's too much to ask for. It can also make me feel better for being respected. However, the answer I got was a rude NO. Come on Visa, how much is a domain going to cost you? By the way, I renewed this domain two months ago. In other words, Visa gets to use this domain name for free for the year to come with my hard-earned money. Oh joy."
Of course, once someone starts to play with their name and Visa shows a friendly face, well, who else could come up and demands for reimbursement.
Only that Blewtooth actually just extended his domain. They didn't even want to pay for his fee. This is a number, that would appear far behind the comma. Chicken shit, so to speak - not much, in layman's terms.
What do I think? Well, there is a blogger who is angry how he has been treated - so it is not about someone forgetting to extend the domain name. It is about how someone is treated by a worldclass (??) company. Many of us are angry. I am writing about this story, and how they treated him. Others did as well. This adds up. Just read the comments and you know what I mean.
Read them fast, because soon, a great blogger will have disappeared. And with him, a lot of bloggers and blog readers, who don't like the way Visa International treated him, and who will tell the story to their friends. There was a time when it was said that one bad experience is about 7 times related to someone else. Nowadays, with the click of a buttong, bad stories or experiences are told multifold. So the next time you think of using Visa to charge for your purchases, may be, just may be, think of Visa, the blogger in Malaysia.
Posted by Andreas at July 12, 2005 01:46 PM
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Comments
Before you boycott anyone, do read this entry from my blog, then you'll know whether to boycott or not.
http://blog.galvintan.com/?p=73
Posted by: Galvin at July 13, 2005 04:52 PM
Clearly, can see from the comments that this is pretty damaging to Visa!
Posted by: Andreas at July 13, 2005 09:10 AM
poor taste indeed. Visa can go roll on cow dung and breathe in the methane gas to inflate their egoitic "win".
Posted by: belacan at July 12, 2005 03:07 PM
I can understand why the company didn't want to compensate them but they could have rephrased it in a better way rather than just a NO, no? (do mind the pun!)
Posted by: Mei at July 12, 2005 02:50 PM
I only use my MasterCard coz to me, the Visa name is too feminine.
Now I have all the more reasons to cancel and cut up my Visa card. I think i will call up my bank today to cancel my Visa.
Bloody Visa International.
Posted by: Din at July 12, 2005 02:02 PM
Quit Blogging RM30
Quit visa.com.my RM50
Quit blogging at visa.com.my ... priceless.
Posted by: JxT2J at July 12, 2005 02:00 PM
BOYCOTT VISA !!!! bcoz for everything else there is MASTERCARD !!!
Posted by: Wingz at July 12, 2005 01:58 PM