Interview with James Okonkwo

Chaos, basically. I open Gmail and there are usually 50-60 emails from overnight, plus another 20-30 Instagram DMs, and a handful of messages on the Shopify chat widget. I use Front to triage them but I read every single one myself because the categories aren't clean. About 70% of them are 'where is my order?' or 'has my order shipped yet?'.

I read the email, copy the order number, switch to Shopify, paste it in, look up the order, check the fulfilment status, copy the tracking number if there is one, switch back to Front, paste it into a reply template, personalise the greeting, hit send. Maybe 90 seconds per email if everything goes smoothly. With 60 status queries a day that's 90 minutes minimum, but it usually takes longer because customers ask follow-ups.

1) Where's my order? 2) Can I change my order? 3) Why hasn't my subscription renewed/renewed early? 4) How do I return something? 5) Can I get a discount? Numbers 1, 2, and 3 could be fully automated I reckon. Number 4 is more nuanced because of damaged goods. Number 5 we just say no to politely.

Recharge handles subscriptions on top of Shopify. Subscription issues are maybe 15% of my volume. The most common one is people getting charged when they forgot they signed up. Recharge sends a renewal reminder email but it goes to spam for some providers. So I refund and pause, then the customer is happy. But that's another 3-5 minutes per case.

Honestly, in a Google Sheet that only I have access to. I log the order number, customer name, reason, and status. When the return arrives at the warehouse, Tom WhatsApps me a photo of it and I update the row. Then I message Priya to refund. If I'm sick or on leave, returns just stop until I'm back, which is bad.

An AI that reads incoming emails, identifies the order number, looks up the status in Shopify and Recharge, and either auto-replies for the simple cases or drafts a reply for me to review for the nuanced ones. Plus a proper returns system that's not just my private spreadsheet. If I got 60% of the volume off my plate I could actually do proactive customer experience work — onboarding new subscribers, recovering churned ones, building a knowledge base.

Mostly with Priya on refunds. I message her, she's deep in reconciliation work, replies maybe an hour later, by which time the customer has emailed me again asking why they haven't been refunded yet. Then I have to interrupt her again. We've talked about giving me Stripe access to refund directly but Priya wants the audit trail in Xero so we haven't done it.

All the time, but it dies in my inbox. Last month a bunch of subscribers complained the new bag design leaks. I told Marcus on Slack but never compiled the data. Looking back, that should have been a flag but I just didn't have time. A simple weekly summary of customer feedback themes would actually be really valuable.

That's basically it. The spreadsheet thing keeps me up at night, honestly. If I got hit by a bus, returns would be a black hole.