Gratitude - Customer service with a smile

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Ordering online is not as easy as it seems

This has nothing to do with unfriendly websites or no products that can be ordered online, nope. It mainly has to do with the fact that our doorbell outside of the building, the one that can connect the delivery guy to our front door to actually deliver something is broken since we moved in. Our landlord has already been informed and he said he was going to call the people from the company that fixes these. Great, the next week, we still haven't heard about it but as we already have some other (really important) things that I needed to pressure him about correcting the mistakes in the rental agreement, I decided to let the less important things slide for a bit and realize this is Spain, and it will probably be done "manana", or otherwise the day after that or maybe even next week.

A non-Spanish phone number doesn't help

I know you can fill in the land code, but we also know that people don't register this when they look at a number while they are trying to deliver a package, they don't expect this to be anything other than the Spanish land code. Which I can understand. When we went to the supermarket downhill yesterday, it was time to test the waters and try their delivery service. I came prepared with a handwritten note with our address, and phone number (land code underlined) knowing that this would speed up the process when the language can be a tiny barrier. I understand a lot, but sometimes I can get lost in what they ask, lol.

No NIE number with us, oops!

I totally did not expect to need my NIE number for the delivery to the supermarket, and I did not have it with me either. Neither did I carry my passport or a copy of it somewhere. There we were with our full grocery cart filled with 4 big watermelons and other heavy items, almost being sent away as they could not add us to the system. Then I realized that earlier that day I had sent our passports to the health insurance company, and I could get them in the email and show my passport number. Problem solved!

The cashier was very patient

One of the great things I appreciate here in Spain is the friendly customer service and a sincere don't worry it's ok when things don't go according to plan. What a difference with the last years of customer service experiences. Some things made it complicated to fill in my customer profile. I totally understand that it's confusing for her.

Dutch passports, Hungarian phone number

Although underlined, my boyfriend had the idea that she probably filled in a Dutch land code as our passports are Dutch. I mean, how could she guess otherwise? Well, to be honest, if she paid attention to the underline, AND what I told her 3 times, but she didn't listen, she assumed that I said DUTCH and totally missed the Hungarian word here 3 times. When she gave me the receipt, I checked and indeed I saw the Dutch land code.

Broken doorbell and wrong telephone number

A recipe for disaster for the poor delivery guy! There was a note that the doorbell was broken, but when at 9.30 the doorbell of our apartment rang, we knew this guy had tried to call the wrong number. Although she made a handwritten note on the receipt, this was not something the delivery guy got to see when bringing our order. I totally expected the guy to be annoyed and pissed maybe, as that's something we experienced over and over again in the past years, but nothing of that was true!

I explained the mistake

And he was still friendly and smiling, it was truly not an issue, he understood and I knew I would have to let the store change it later when I was going there for groceries this week. "No pasa nada". This guy delivered all these items with a smile and was still friendly while I could have understood his annoyance (especially if he was trying to reach us for a long time, which I don't know), but yet he stayed friendly and professional. I really appreciate this and I'm grateful that I see more and more understanding people around us as well as people that greet you on the streets even if you don't know them.

Grateful for nice customer service

They say you don't know what you got 'till it's gone, but it also goes the other way around! In this case, you realize more than what you didn't have was a huge miss and contributing to the overall feeling of not feeling happy and at home. Good customer service should be normal, but we have experienced mostly the opposite during the last 5 years or so, to the point that it made us wonder if that even still existed.

Spain has already made me feel welcome and at home again since the day we arrived, and this was the same some years ago when we arrived here. I never felt unwelcome, while that was often the case in Hungary. Sad, but true.

Meanwhile, we managed to get Spanish sim cards yesterday so from now on this delivery issue will not happen again. But let's still hope the doorbell will be fixed soon anyway. But it will probably be "manana", lol.