#1365 – Customer Service, Cultural Challenges, and Political Realities in Latin America

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came up to play and now I wonder Hello there all you ex-pad wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started Alright, let's dig into the email pile. I have a huge stack to go through This one comes from Hubert in Cincinnati. Here's a question that deserves a straight answer. He says Johnny Have you noticed that customer service in Latin America has gotten better or worse since you've been down?

[00:51] Well Hubert good question, by the way who would name their kid Hubert? In my day police would have a field day with a guy named Hubert Remember Hubert Humphrey. He got his ass whooped Anyway Hubert, I'd like to tell you customer service has gotten much better since I landed down here some 30 plus years ago After all everyone down here is on social media. They're all connected to everything and anything up in the first world everything gringo That said you'd think customer service would have improved in a big way, right? Plus there's enough gringo owned and operated businesses that Latinos see how things should run because you know We grew up in a very competitive cutthroat business culture Most of us have a pretty keen eye for the details

[01:37] You'd think the customer service attitude we bring down would rob off on Latinos, right? not to mention lots of Latin Americans get business degrees down here in the universities and as Part of a business or business administration degree you take classes on customer service That's part of the plan So you'd think Latinos with business degrees at least would be all in on customer service, right? Why not? Every medium and large Latin American company has a customer service desk or a department You can just phone them up and say connect me to customer service and you'll get connected and being that this is Latin America The customer service people are generally happy friendly courteous and most obliging. What more could you ask for? Down here if you go to any business campus at a university here and study customer service

[02:25] You'll find it's studied and analyzed to the nth degree Just like up in the states even more so down here because they've got all those call centers Latin American India are the call center capitals of the world and with call centers. That's the name of the game customer service But alas even after saying all that Hearing about all those ostensibly positive developments. I still can't say I've seen any improvement at all You know in customer service. There is a chain of command Problem is even if you're interacting with the nicest most friendly obliging person don't get your hopes up Though you might end up dating her Don't believe it when she says your computer will be fixed in three days Remember she's your first contact and she'll probably hand you off to someone else a technical person

[03:12] Whatever second person in the chain of command just be prepared somewhere along the lines Someone's gonna drop the ball So still just as it was when I first got down here Bad customer service and shitty drivers topped the list of the most common gringo and expat complaints In fact gringo is an expensive and complaining about Latin American customer service ever since Columbus arrived In a related email I got from a guy named Daniel who moved out to Cuenca Ecuador. He says Johnny in My little gated guarded community in Cuenca Ecuador turns out the guy next door is a service manager For clado the big Internet and telephone company the biggest in Latin America and almost all Latin American countries One day at a neighborhood Sunday get-together. We were sitting around talking over barbecued hamburger sausages and grilled chicken feet

[04:03] We were talking about the difference in the way US companies versus Latin American companies do business And he very candidly told me the difference is customer service In fact, he said clado the company he works for has pretty bad almost non-existent customer service and any business They lose due to said bad customer service will flip over to Movistar the other big Internet company But he said Movistar has even worse customer service than clado He said it doesn't take long for pissed-off clients who've moved to Movistar to flip back over to us when they realized Movistar's customer service is even worse Hubert goes on to say poor customer service is a way of life in Latin America Latinos don't even know it. They just accept whatever customer service. They get good bad or ugly

[04:51] Mostly it's because almost all their lives Latinos have dealt with monopolies Electricity water telephone cable even gas stations. We're at one time in most Latin American countries owned and operated by the government All right me Johnny here, you know, he's absolutely right talk about putting the retires in charge When I first went down to Costa Rica, I discovered the government owned all the utilities including the telephone company I applied for a telephone landline that was before cell phones. It took two years Anyway back to Herbert. He says I've also noticed He said one of the reasons customer service is so bad in many restaurants is that the waiters and waitresses pull their tips Divide him amongst themselves He says I used to be part owner of a restaurant in New Jersey and I found the easiest way to bypass

[05:41] Performance and upset the reward incentive motive and ensure at most mediocre customer service is to let the workers pull their tips Signed ex-pat Hubert former treadmill occupant from New Jersey Alright Hubert thanks for that, you know my personal observation about customer service here is that things haven't changed much at all And all the years I've been down here. I can count on one hand the times I've had spectacular customer service though. I have to say there were many times I thought I had great customer service, but in the end I really didn't so what do I mean by that? Well, let's say for example, you book a room in a hotel It's got a mini bar you open the mini bar and the light goes on but it's not cold Something's wrong with the compressor or something within the refrigerator is on the blink

[06:27] Well, you call down to housekeeping you report the bad fridge The person on the other end the phones ever so nice and accommodating. They're just so sorry it happened They'll send someone up right away and you're thinking great Shit happens and it's nice. They're so on top of it Yeah, well nine times out of ten or maybe nineteen times out of twenty you'll go out for the day come back open your fridge and Nothing still on the blink now, I can't tell you exactly how many times that's happened to me But it's happened so many times. I'm just well used to it I expect as much one of the only ways I found you can get real rapid customer services to make a personal visit down to the Front desk and state your claim firmly Preferably in front of some other hotel guests loud enough so they can hear it Because Latinos and Latinos being so much nicer and friendlier than we are

[07:15] You can tell they don't like confrontation. They'll do anything to avoid a scene In fact, I've seen many a gringo at a hotel or conference blow up at the poor Latino or Latina at the front desk Believe me that front desk positions a tough job Anyway, this might sound a little rough But Latinos and Latinos have a different idea of what clean and hygienic means funny thing too Many are very meticulous about their clothing and personal appearance. But when you visit the house, it can be an eye-opener I've been in many Latino houses where I've popped my head into the bathroom and thought man I hope my luck holes out don't have to use that In fact, I'll never forget what expat Eddie said to me the first time he made the rounds through Latin America He'd been down here about six months traveling around and he said to me Johnny when you're checking into a hotel here in Latin

[08:04] America never trust the number of stars Posted outside the front door or in the lobby or for that matter on TripAdvisor TripAdvisor can be sneaky They're captured by advertisers too and that's beholden to certain algorithms. God. Isn't anybody anything or any corporation unbiased these days? Anyway, as far as Latin American hotel ratings Expat Eddie said a long time ago and it's still true today Whenever you see a rating subtract one to one and a half stars Then you'll be in the ballpark as to what the hotels really like Oh and since we're talking about customer service or lack thereof here in Latin America There's another thing that really makes me laugh I walk into a place like Walmart Starbucks Costco known as price mark down here

[08:51] Many have a bulletin board and a wall of fame, you know where they post the employee of the week or the month Well, wouldn't you know it just like everything else here in Latin America? When a business or a government gloms on to a new first world idea like, you know the employee of the month thing They go great guns on it for a couple of months anyway But soon enough interest peters out and no one keeps up with it or pays attention to it anymore For example a while back. I was in a big commercial grocery chain called Latore in Guatemala And I was at the customer service desk returning something, you know, they have guarantees there and they actually honor him My Osterizer blender had broken and it was in the one-year guarantee and I brought it back to the information desk You know customer service and right behind the counter. There was a photo of the employee of the month

[09:42] Funny thing too. I remember that same picture up there last time I was at the customer service desk about six months earlier Employee of the month back then same guy for a second I thought man that guy must be a real gem and you know since I was standing there a long while going over the receipt Showing the lady that the motor in my Osterizer was fried, you know working things out with a guarantee I was making small talk with her and I said, you know that smiling guy up there the employee of the month I said wow, that guy's a real superstar employee of the month almost all the time She turned around and looked up and said oh him for a despedito. I say mucho tiempo Which means in English he was fired a long time ago And still months later, they haven't gotten around to removing his employee of the month picture

[10:29] So much for truth in advertising, huh? I wonder why he got fired. I should have asked her that That's why I always thought in a perfect world every business would have a wall of fame and a wall of shame You know employee of the month and dickhead of the month You know so customers could be on the lookout when they're walking through the store and since we're talking hypotheticals here How about a picture of the favorite client of the month and the asshole client of the month, too? Probably both be gringos Maybe both would be the same gringo. I mean, you know in a perfect world We'd all want to know ahead of time who the good guys are in the assholes, too, right? But back to the business of restaurants and service workers pooling all their tips and dividing them amongst the staff now I've heard gringos and expats complain about the fact that they'll add 10% service charge to a bill down here

[11:18] Which is supposed to be the tip again divided amongst the staff and I've heard gringos argue Well if you don't like that system tip on top of it for the individual waiter You pay the 10% and add a little extra to it The problem is the extra propena you might throw in is also Bixed in with a tip pool or tip jar and divided amongst the staff So again, you totally bypass the performance reward incentive Basically pooling of tips and dividing them equally amongst all staff is the very definition of socialism By the way, the only waiters waitresses and service people who like that system are the slugs and laggards now imagine if they pooled tips at strip clubs that would mean that Lizzo and the dwarf chick would get the same cut as Kim Kardashian and Cardi B and you know, some might say there's something just not right about that

[12:07] By the way, it's a thought experiment. You don't have to imagine it All right back to customer service Well, my personal observation is that things have not changed much in the customer relations department in all the time I've been down here and you know as much as Scringles the next patch talk about it as much as we complain as much as we're on the same page thinking it's spotty at best And sometimes absolutely miserable Remember, we're talking about Latin American owned and operated businesses here However, when you're talking about gringo owned and operated businesses, it can be much different Almost always a bit better because we have a higher bar a higher standard Anyway, as disappointed as you might be about the customer service down here It really is a double-edged sword if it wasn't for bad customer service, we would lose much of our own gringo advantage in business

[12:55] That's why so many gringos and expats who start up mom-and-pop hotels and restaurants do so well They're certainly not reinventing the wheel. They've got a ton of competition But the competition has built in bad to mediocre customer service They're short on the details in you as a gringo know that All right. How about this email from Juanito? He says Johnny I'm glad at least someone is speaking up on how the seven million Venezuelans who've escaped the country were pretty much prohibited to vote in the recent election However, if you think about it, they already voted they voted against Maduro by getting the hell out of Venezuela They voted with their feet Unfortunately, those millions of votes can never be tabulated red tape made it impossible for

[13:43] Venezuelans living outside the country to vote the only place they were allowed to was at their foreign embassies an impossible feat for most of them The other thing that's glazed over in the first world media Occasionally, you'll hear alternative media talking about how the US government with alphabet agencies and NGOs are trying to throw the election from inside Of course, that's true One of the main goals of American alphabet agencies like the CIA and NSA is regime change You don't play ball with America will change your regime They're good at it. They've done it in more than 50 countries Another important thing that never seems to get spoken about the fact that Venezuelans living in Venezuela Are afraid not to vote for Maduro life is rough here. Yes. I live in Venezuela

[14:29] With the average Venezuelan living on thirty to fifty dollars US a month The average Venezuelan living here does not want any more grieve for strife in his life If you oppose Maduro in any way like voting against him or protesting It'll only make your life tougher. So people are afraid not to vote for him. So Even if in the weeks ahead the election results show it was legitimately done. The votes were counted correctly and tabulated correctly, etc I can tell you from my own personal experience living here in an interior Venezuelan town and neighborhood if you don't vote you get on the list You're in big trouble If you vote against Maduro you get on a list and you're forever worrying about it The only option left is to vote for the guy then you'll not be rocking the boat

[15:14] And I can tell you this there isn't a single Venezuelan over 50 who wants to rock the boat. Life is tough enough So thank you Johnny for on your previous show saying at least some truth That almost none of the millions of eligible Venezuelan voters living outside the country all absolute haters of the Maduro regime Even so they were not able to vote. It reminds me a bit of the 2016 elections in the United States Hollywood VIPs and actors would go on the news and state bluntly if Trump won they would leave the country move to Canada Trump won in 2016 and no one moved to Canada in Venezuela Unless you work for the government in business with the government or in the black market You're just getting by and desperate to get out Oh and in Venezuela if you have a business you are in business with the government by law

[16:01] They're your partner The point is seven millions of Venezuelans hated Maduro enough to tell their friends and relatives They were leaving and they did Johnny I live in the interior of Venezuela and I was there to witness the vote in my state Maduro did not win one regional Electoral ballot so at least in the interior people weren't afraid to vote against him But Caracas were the majority of the population resides. It's a different story again I repeat in my state Maduro did not win one electoral region I even stayed on at my electoral center till 9 30 p.m. When all votes were scrutinized and Maduro lost Overwhelmingly, but the news reported just the opposite. I Expected that though it happened the same way in the last election

[16:48] I should mention too that in my little city in the interior three days after the election already 16 teenagers were arrested their crimes Protesting within visual distance of a polling center those teenagers are in jail They've not been allowed attorneys and they're being tortured Which I know for sure because I'm friends with the attorneys in the penal system in our area Juanito signs off by saying thank you for talking about Venezuela Johnny People need to hear the truth from Venezuelans not from biased journalists who come down for a couple of days Stay in a Hilton and get their so-called news by interviewing a few government connected businessmen over drinks at the bar. Oh And Johnny, I almost forgot Those arrests I mentioned mostly Adolescents and college-age kids have been ongoing and this is the part that's also not been reported in the news

[17:39] Did you know there is an app called VEN a PP van app? Venezuelans can download it from Google Play and the App Store Once you have it you can get online as an anonymous Informer once you're on it you can report people who protest and report people you don't happen alike Now that app van app is an app the government set up They originally introduced it ostensibly as a place for the average Venezuelan to report public nuisances The question is what's a public nuisance? Unfortunately, it has turned out to be an app where civilian supporters of the regime the Maduro regime Can inform on their neighbors and people they don't happen alike so through this app the government has accumulated a large list of dissenters and

[18:25] According to Douglas Rico the head of Venezuela's criminal investigations unit His units are going door-to-door and what they're calling operation knock knock to ferret out dissidents reported by their neighbors on that app So the government's using all methods at hand Including technology security forces intelligence services the armed civilians armed forces and Community-based informants through the VEN app to keep a lid on and repress what's happening on the street level. Hmm. All right me Johnny here That's pretty Orwellian Imagine if the US government created an app Where you could anonymously inform on your neighbors or anyone you believed was critical of the party in power Hmm shades of Covid it. Of course, we all know where an app like that would pop up first, right?

[19:14] California and now for the $64,000 question How's your plan be coming? Oh and do you know the origin of the $64,000 question? It was a game show on CBS started in 1955 The really sad thing though is when you hear what the purchasing power of 64 thousand dollars was in 1955 the equivalent to $750,000 today. In other words a guy who won the $64,000 question jackpot in 1955 could retire Lots of the winners did because it was like winning 750,000 today speaking of today 2024 if you were to win $64,000 today if you decided to retire it wouldn't last you a year and Now an email from one of our German listeners Werner. He says Johnny as health conscious as you are

[20:03] Did you know the practically all the commercially sold citrus fruits are treated with an artificial coating? usually a combination of thiophenol orthophenophenol or imazeal Hmm. I won't even try to spell any of those. You know what my mother used to say and she is 100% German, too She'd say read the labels on the food in the grocery store And if there's some ingredient or chemical you can't pronounce don't buy it She said likely your body won't be able to recognize it either Anyway, Werner says here in Germany practically all citrus fruits are treated with one of those three or four mentioned chemicals They're sprayed on the surface on the peel though in Germany because of our laws There's a tag or sticker that comes with a clear statement that says shall he make zoom visser geeks knit

[20:54] Whatever the hell that means You could tell I don't know any German Anyway, what it means is in English this peel is unsuitable for consumption It's a very unconditional statement burner says a bit scary to be sure So those chemicals do penetrate the peel though. They may not get into the fruit. There's a warning about the peel Yet people use citric fruit peels in all kinds of food products like cakes bakery cocktails, etc Lots of recipes. I've noticed requires citrus fruit peels yet here in Germany and throughout the European Union There'll be a sticker on it that says peel unsuitable for consumption However, Johnny, he says most supermarkets here will carry both treated and organic citrus fruits

[21:39] So then why are the fruit peels sprayed? Well, apparently not for insect infestation is they generally don't like citric fruit. It's for the mold You know how if you let oranges or lemons sit around for a couple of days or a week They get sort of a white or yellow powdery mold on them. Well, that's what those sprays are supposed to inhibit their antifungal The interesting thing though, is that neither of those fruits sprayed or unsprayed seem to be immune from getting moldy Both of them take a while, but they do get moldy eventually Something else I've noticed Johnny here in Germany citrus fruits will come without an organic label Of course, that means they're not organic, but some are now showing an explicit label that says shaale ist Virtsenbar again, I don't know German. But what it means is this peel is edible

[22:29] What I'm wondering Johnny is are there fungicide products around that are non-toxic or non-carcinogenic? I doubt it Especially if the sellers are going through all that trouble to tell you you shouldn't eat the peel The whole thing is kind of confusing to me I wonder if in Latin America where they grow all kinds of citrus fruit Do they treat the peel with a fungicide too? And if they do, is there a warning label on the peel signed Verner W? PS vacation and time off permitting. I'll be at your next seminar Alright, thanks for that Verner Verner you taught me something today What you said just seems so strange that you'd have lemons limes oranges, whatever with stickers on them saying the peel is not edible Hell, I know people into health and such who have smoothies every day and they drop the whole damn lemon or orange in there

[23:19] Of course, I'm talking about people down here in Latin America where you don't see such labels on fruits at all You know, I've had my own lemon lime orange and Lima trees on my own property They grew big tall and healthy dropped lots of fruits and I never once sprayed them didn't even know you needed to spray them Now I know once in a while my gardener would fertilize them But insecticide and spraying never and man, I'll tell you those lemons grew so big They look like oranges and some of the oranges grew so big. They look like grapefruits Now if you're gonna pick up lemons or limes, whatever in a big market Most of the time they're not even bagged or in sacks They come loose you buy them loose and the only time you ever see a citrus fruit or an apple for that matter with a sticker on it is when it's been imported from a nearby country like for example chili or just lately Peru

[24:08] There are lots of fruits in various Central American markets and grocery stores that come from Chile and they're labeled as such Now here's where it gets kind of weird if you go to Walmart or Costco, which is known as price mark down here They'll be grapes blueberries strawberries, etc. Oranges tangerines. You name it Imported from the States. It'll say so right on the sticker on a label and that means of course, unless they're labeled organic They're just loaded with pesticides herbicides fungicides Funny thing though is sometimes you'll see the locally produced fruit side by side right next to the imported stuff For example, you'll often see tangerines Called mandarinas or clementines down here the ones imported from California are perfect round unblemished and

[24:56] The ones right next to them. The locally grown ones will be a little oblong slightly different color variations Some with little bumps on them look like tumors often bigger but not so uniform Definitely cheaper than the imported ones and the taste as good or better than the imported variety But you know for Latinos and Latinas, it's the gringo wannabe thing It's a status symbol to buy the gringo imported stuff when you've got the imported stuff in your cart You're right now now me I always prefer the locally grown stuff I've been at the checkout counter when an upscale Latino or Latina gives me the eye Why would a gringo ever buy a local product when there's a u.s. Product equivalent available? That's the typical attitude But back to this business about toxic fungicides on citrus fruits

[25:43] Can somebody please tell me if up there by you you're seeing labels like Werner's talking about in Germany That's a this peel is not edible That's the first I've heard of it How about you or maybe there should be labels on you as grown citrus fruit But they just don't put them on because the pesticide and fungicide lobbies are bigger than the cancer lobbies I guess it all depends on who spreads around the most dough in Congress Alright, we're getting towards the end of the show. No, let's not leave on a sour note Let's leave on sort of how about and that chronistic note Did you know dr. Ken Murray professor of medicine at USC wrote an essay called how doctors die? It showed the degree to which doctors choose different end-of-life treatments for themselves Then they recommend for their own patients

[26:31] From his book he writes doctors don't die like the rest of us He wrote what's unusual about doctors is not how much treatment they get compared to most Americans, but how little He says for all the time they spend fending off illness and death for others The doctors themselves tend to be more pragmatic when faced with their own deaths when they're nearing the end or seeing it coming They know exactly what's gonna happen They know exactly the choices and they generally have access to any of the most cutting-edge medical care But they don't dive in head first they go gently He says your doctor may throw the kitchen sink at a patient's cancer, but choose just palliative or holistic care for himself Hmm some might call it hypocrisy some might call it irony

[27:17] Either way, there's some things you learn you wish ahead Oh, and did you hear about the new book that just came out by Robert Lufkin MD? It's called lies. I taught in medical school got that one on my list You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America If you need some help with your own plan B We can schedule a one-on-one phone or Skype consult Just send me an email the expat files at gmail dot com And if you want to get on the waiting list for my next week long expat insider seminar in Central America Where you're guaranteed to get a two to five year head start on your plan B Send me an email the expat files at gmail.com