Mrs. Calabash

I used to have this old record (that’s right – vinyl, 33 1/3 --NOT 78, wise guy) of Jimmy Durante singing “Young at Heart.” Come to think of it, it may have been a 45 on a single with “Time Goes By” or something like that on the other side. Durante’s voice is rasping, like a 64 Mustang starting up. But when you hear that voice all the gizmos of modern life disappear from sight and your vision goes black and white. You’re curled up in front of a roaring fire with your hands wrapped around a cup of hot chocolate. And you’re thinking of every long lost friend and relative when Jimmy utters those immortal words at the end of the song, “Good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are.”

Sorry to say, but next time I hear the song I may also start thinking about one of our customers. How many times does a CEO in our country receive a letter from somebody who is practically begging to be a customer? I got one a couple days ago and frankly I’m feeling a bit depressed today when I think about it. The letter was from Georgia and was typed neatly on a single page. It was beautifully written, patient and thoughtful in its message. It said:

“I tried to enroll for new service with your company. The customer
representative…was as helpful as she could be. She made a three-way call
to my husband who was away at the time, whose name the account would be under,
to get approval for the credit check. Upon doing the credit check, she
came back and said we were denied. My husband proceeded to call [the
Credit Agency]” which “told us we did not have enough ‘open credit’. There
was not a credit problem; we could pay the monthly bill. I proceeded to
call your service center back and asked if the monthly bill could be taken out
of a credit card account or a checking account. I received the answer of
no. Once [the Credit Agency] denies you, you’re denied.

“Do you not want new business? My husband and I are not
credit risks. I understand you have to be very careful these days who is
enrolled for service. My husband and I seem to have fallen through the
crack on this policy… I still would like service with your company.
I thought you should know that this particular policy is losing your company
business from people in my family’s situation.”

I handed the letter to my assistant and said, “Let’s sign up this customer asap.” Within minutes we had contacted the customer service center, which is located in Florida, and then contacted the letter writer by phone. Unfortunately, the next day I received the following email:

“As a follow up, we were able to finally contact [the Customer]. She advised that she … will not go with MXenergy unless we change our policies. We did advise that we were willing to enroll her but she stated that she thought the policy should be changed and not just for her.”

I hope Mrs. Calabash sees this, wherever she is. First, I want to thank my correspondent for contacting me. Her concern was reasonable and I am glad she brought it to my attention. Second, I want to applaud her for standing up for other potential customers who might be in a similar situation. Unfortunately, she was correct in her letter when she said “you have to be very careful these days who is enrolled for service.”

Each month we deliver tens of millions of dollars worth of gas to customers around the country. Often we do not receive payment until over two months later. It is only prudent for us to be very cautious about whom we serve. If we have many customers who do not pay us for the gas we deliver, we would have to charge all other customers a surcharge to cover the cost of the bad debt. The result would be that our loyal and reliable customers would pay a premium for non-paying customers. A credit policy helps all customers.

But a credit policy also has to be fair. That is why we are constantly reviewing our credit standards to make sure they are not too stringent or too lenient. We will certainly do that in this case. Hopefully in the near future we will have a policy that addresses the situation here of a customer that is clearly a good credit but may have missed payment of a couple bills.

But it’s late. And even though it’s 90 degrees outside and I’m not interested in hot chocolate, I’m still in a mood to listen to Jimmy Durante. So… Good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are. And thanks for writing…