Not Leaping for Joy

We've finally hit the infamous French service wall.  The internet and phone in the apartment are on the same network and it went out two days ago, on Saturday.  The notice on the screen says to call a service number, but with no phone we couldn't do that.  The walls  in the apartment are so thick we can't use the cellphone indoors.  So we took the DartyBox router and our problem over to Darty.

The young lady there made it clear that it was in fact our problem, that a service call could be arranged in no other way, and shrugged with Gallic insouciance.  I responded with an American fit, pointing out (in reasonably good French, a part of my mind noticed at the time) that it was ridiculous to require a customer to use a non-operable phone to report a non-operable phone.  It did no good of course.

By the time we got home and hooked up the router, with all kinds of odd possible scenarios planned (e.g. one of us stands in the courtyard with the cellphone, yelling techical instructions to the other in the apartment) the computer and phone suddenly were on again.  I grabbed the phone, called the required number, got a really nice man who agreed to speak English (and did it well) and discovered that 64 DartyBoxes had gone out for the last two days and were now back on line.  Sorry about that.

So although our service experiences at BHV have been exemplary, they are apparently not the norm.  Darty could call them for lessons.  But their phones might not be working.

The Customer is Sometimes Right

I had always heard that the term customer service in France was a joke, and that the latter was never offered to the former. Horror stories of standing in long lines, of being sent from one person to another to a third, of being told that it was impossible to do whatever it is that needs doing are part of the folklore. I'm hoping writing this won't jinx us, but we've had excellent service so far.

We bought a teapot at a little shop in the neighborhood last week and the first time I used it all the water leaked out onto the counter. On closer examination there was a hairline crack where the spout met the pot. We decided to take it back to the store and see what the response would be. It wasn't very expensive so the expected "nothing we can do" wouldn't be too painful.

The man behind the counter listened to my "petite problem", took the pot, got another one from the shelf, went to the back and returned with the new pot filled with water. He tested it for leakage. None. He poured the water into the old pot. It leaked. He took both backstage, returned with the new one, wiped it dry, and then said the first thing he had said to us during the entire process. "Excusez-nous, madam, s'il vous plait." He then wished us a good day and said au revoir.

Sure, it could have been a fluke. But we've had two occasions to go to the Bazar de l'Hotel de Ville (BHV, as it's known) to look for some housewares and each time we met pleasant salespeople who directed us to what we needed, took time to tell us the name of the thing we were looking for when we didn't know it, explained the options, pointed out pros and cons, and wished us a good day. Yes, there were one or two perfunctory folks, but this is BHV, people, this is the place I'd been told was especially designed to make you crazy. The French must be losing their touch.

There's a bus that runs only on Sundays and holidays called the Balabus (in Yiddish this would mean the head of the house, but somehow I don't think that's why they call it that...just a guess.) The route covers a lot of famous sights. It happens to stop in the Place de la Bastille and we took it, just for the ride. Sitting up high, looking out at the gorgeous monuments and the Seine sparkling in the sun was a hell of a way to make up for the missing Sunday New York Times.

You find lots of interesting things right in our very own neighborhood, too.