It’s safe to say we’ve all been in a customer service
situation where we wondered if our issue was ever going to get resolved. You
may have had multiple concerns simultaneously or simply had to explain your
concern one way and then explain it again…and again.
Recently, I was listening to a phone conversation my dad was
having about a customer service issue in which he had one simple request and
one simple question. They were not unreasonable and certainly sounded like
things the company should have dealt with and taken care of on a daily basis.
Despite his patience, I listened to him repeat the same two statements at least
five times in the same phone call. He was transferred from person to person,
each time having to start over and express in detail why he was calling and
what he needed. He was on the phone for almost 45 minutes. I started thinking: There has to be a more efficient way of
resolving this issue. Why isn’t he off the phone yet? My dad concluded the
conversation fairly confident the problem would not happen again, but not 100%
sure.
So why did it take the company so many tries to fulfill a
simple request? Of course, not every associate will know how to handle every
situation, but there should be a streamlined system in place to get customers
to the right person in a matter of minutes. This company’s customer service
procedures were clearly disorganized—make sure yours won’t be with a few easy
tips.
First, associates need to be prepared for various customer
service scenarios. My dad was very polite, but not everyone will be. Employees
need to learn how to listen to the problem, remain calm, acknowledge the
mistake, and if needed, ask for help. If they take every disgruntled attitude
personally, they will never survive in their position. If the first person didn’t
know what to do, he should have known who to put on the line to take care of
the issue and that should have been the end of it. Second, policies and
procedures for daily operations and simple requests should not only be taught
in training to each employee, but also available in writing for quick learning
on the fly. When ideas for improvement come about, they should be implemented
as soon as possible. Finally, no matter
what the problem is, don’t make the customer repeat themselves a thousand times
to explain the problem to several different people. If you are the first person
they contact, listen carefully and take notes if needed so that if someone else
(or more than one person) needs to step in, you
can be the one to reiterate their request, not them. At the very least, you can
tell them you will call them back within the hour if more time is needed to
resolve the problem. This will save the company and the customer time and hopefully,
keep them from getting frustrated. Make it happen.
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2014 eMarketing 4 Business LLC
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