Plan C

I love my Bose headset. I can’t imagine all my travel without it. I love it so much that I actually wore out the rubber ear cups recently and had to order replacements.

The replacements came just in time for my recent trip to the UK. There were instructions on how to remove the old cups and insert the new ones. Right cup, done. No problem. Snapped right into place. Left cup? Not so much. I tried and tried and while it would gingerly stay in place, it didn’t take much to knock it off, sometimes frustratingly down into the mechanics of my plane seat.

If you don’t own a Bose product then you may not know they are one of those rare companies known for their unparalleled customer service. Since I had gotten the right cup to work with no problem it was obvious to me that there was something clearly deficient with the left cup. So upon arrival in San Francisco last week, I took my headset to the Bose store expecting one of two plans:

Plan A: they would have a set of replacement cups that included both a good right and a good left cup and I’d be on my way.

Plan B: knowing Bose, if they didn’t have the pieces I needed, they would just give me a new headset for free. They’re that kind of company.

So I proudly showed Trevor at the Bose store how I’d successfully attached the right cup but how there must have been something wrong with the left cup. I demonstrated how quickly it would pop right off. Trevor, instead, had his own ideas and introduced me to Plan C: Trevor, with little effort, manages to successfully install my previously considered deficient left cup. Certain he’d only done so to the level of my own previous limited success, I gave it a pull. But this time it stuck.

Damn it.

I looked sheepishly at Trevor and thanked him for his time and assistance, and packed up my headset, getting ready to leave the store with my head hung low. His response? With a big smile and friendly energy, he said, “Hey, that’s what we’re here for!”

Now later that same day I had what was probably my fourth or fifth skype conversation with a father in Bahrain. He had lots of questions. Actually, his wife had lots of questions but she kept making him contact me for the answers. With each additional conversation, I noticed he got more sheepish, like a guy who thought he was lacking a working left cup when all he was lacking was the ability to install it.

So when he thanked me profusely at the end of our chat that afternoon, apologized again for “bothering” me and letting me know he thought we were done with these skype calls, I simply said to him, “Hey, that’s what we’re here for.” As we signed off, I could see him sit up a bit, smile, and thank me with a bit of relief that he truly wasn’t bothering me.

Thanks for the excellent line, Trevor. It’s good to be reminded.