Clearly.
Over the holidays, my normal annoyance of receiving other people’s purchase confirmation emails quadruples.
For those who don’t know, I was a beta tester for Gmail way back when, and I got the great username — just my first and last name @ gmail.com. Problem: every other woman in the English speaking world with the same name mistakenly uses it (forgetting that all-important extra number or letter in the address) for buying stuff online. And of course, their receipts come to me.
Usually, I just delete them, because it happens pretty much once a week, on average. But this particular receipt had some very personal information on it, so I decided to reply and tell the retailer that they had the wrong person. This actually took place, over a series of four exchanges:
Me: Your customer has mistakenly listed my email as hers. Would you please notify her? I’m in Ohio — she’s in North Carolina.
Them: Thanks for contacting us. We will look into it.
Two days later, another message about this lady’s purchase comes to me. Instead of emailing, I called their customer service line.
Me: <Blah, blah, recount the situation.>
Them: Let me get into the computer and see if I can delete the email. ……….. There, it’s gone. Thanks for calling.
Next day, another purchase, another email. I emailed them *again*.
Me: I’ve emailed customer service AND called them, and this still isn’t fixed. I’m getting personal information about one of your customers — FROM YOU. I don’t think you want this. Please, notify this woman that she has entered the wrong address.
Them: Thank you for contacting us. We have updated her email address to <my.email.address.except.with.periods.between.the.two.names @ gmail.com>
Me: Um…that won’t work, either. Gmail does not recognize punctuation in their usernames, so what you have changed in your database *STILL* points to my address. I will continue to receive personal information about this woman from you. Is anyone listening?
MAILER-DAEMON – Mail Delivery Subsystem: Your message cannot be delivered. Reason: recipient rejected.
Is it the weekend yet?
Girlie-
Eliminate the middle-man. Email this lady directly and tell her what’s going on. Tell her you tried to contact the retailer and got no satisfaction. Personally, I would *want* to know that my personal information was going somewhere it shouldn’t be going. Two things would happen:
1. I’d be much more careful about putting in my email address – including all the numbers, dots, dashes, underscores etc.
2. I’d be more than a little annoyed that the retailer didn’t do something about the error and would be sure to let them know.
PK
10 days ’till my girls get here!
Dear Lord. I’m with PK. Mail the lady directly. She’ll probably thank you for bringing it to her attention. Ya know…some companies…well, this isn’t the forum to go into THAT noise!
I hear ya, gals. I will send her a note through the mail, as her email address is listed as mine. You’re right — it’s the right thing to do, and I would certainly want someone to tell me if my lingerie sizes and special requests of the manufacturer were being shared with all and sundry!
(Yay for your girls’ visit, PK!)