Why is it that companies shy away from complaints and complaining customers? Complaints are GOLDEN. Complaints are actually an opportunity to for both company and customer for better service all round.
President of Service Quality Institute John Tschohl says that “When customers complain to a company about its products or services, they are giving that company an opportunity to improve”. Investigating and resolving customer complaints are an amazing growth hack for the discerning organization, believe me.
Working a few years ago as Customer Service Manager at a thriving financial institution, I learned the absolute value of listening to customers and gleaning insight from their feedback.
Back then I went so far as to include soliciting and submitting customer complaints to my teams’ performance matrices. It worked a charm, really. It meant that my people were more ready to listen when customers complained and less inclined to sweep complaints under the rug.
Related Reading: Getting Customers To Complain
This on the other hand helped me as Customer Service Manager get a firm handle on what the thorny customer issues were. Thereby helping the organization resolve customer issues with alacrity. In addition, this helped us understand customer expectations. When an organization understands what its customers expect of it, it is better poised to give customers what they want.
I have however noticed a paradox where customers are reluctant to complain or seek redress for poor service. This has always befuddled me. I always ask ‘don’t you want value for your money?’; ‘don’t you want some satisfaction on account of poor service?’
It’s unfortunate that to my question customers more often than not will tell me ‘I don’t want to get anyone into trouble’. Others would say ‘why complain when my complaint will be swept under the carpet and I could be branded as a troublemaker.
A lot has been said about how customers ought to present their complaints; with very little said about the cultural support within organizations that encourage customers to complain. This isn’t so much about the ‘how’ of taking complaints, but the cultural enablers that support the free flow of feedback from customers to the organization and vice versa.
First of all, organizations need to reinforce the culture that assures customers that they are not seeking complaints to punish any employee. Rather, the objective of soliciting complaints is to ensure a better service or product experience for the customer. When this ideology permeates the company, customers instinctively know that on one is on a witch hunt and that complaints are improvement tools not for punishment.
It is also important to bring customers in as key stakeholders and banner bearers of the brand. When customers feel they have a stake in the brand, they will walk up and tell you when things are going wrong and tell you what they believe the problem is and what you can do to fix it.
One way I was able to do this when I worked as Customer Service Manager was to have annual Customer Forums where all parties (customer and organization) met to discuss customer impacting issues ranging from employee attitude, company policy that seemed frustrating to customers as well as providing an opportunity to listen to customer expectation. The forum was always exciting as well as beneficial to both customer and organization.
Many customers will attest to being treated with suspicion and apathy when they present complaints; this attitude could stem from a cultural view within the organization that complains are bad and that someone has to be punished. This may not be so; it could simply be that the service or product has failed to meet or exceed the customers’ expectation.
It therefore behooves the organization to ensure that when customers do come in with complaints the reception must be both professional and cordial.
It is also essential that organizations have systems that support the complaints process. This way irrespective of the employee receiving the complaint the response is based on organizational culture and service strategy. Furthermore, customers will come to expect the same level of response at every customer touch point in the organization.
Need I mention the need for constant and consistent training of employees specifically regarding customer complaints? But I will emphasize that training must never be one off, but consistent and repeated. Organizations must not assume that training will take after one fix. Training must be reinforced and topped off ‘every three months’ according to John Tschohl, and I agree with him.
In dealing with some organizations, I notice that they don’t give customers much of a choice on the medium for sending in their complaints. Sometimes it has to be in person and no other way. Other times, complaints must be sent to a specific mail box; and complaints not received in this way will not be investigated. This is the worst way to go about encouraging complaints. I recommend that everyone in an organisation should be Master Complaint Resolver; meaning anyone can accept complaints either by phone, email, snail mail, face to face or fax. Increase the surface area and see how this supports the narrative that you are open to receiving complaints and have nothing to hide.
In conclusion, I strongly believe every organisation must pave the road to complaints; encourage customers to keep them coming and ensure employees see complaints as a strategic tool for business growth.
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