Month: November 2013

You were given an example of poor customer service. Perhaps an explanation and discussion now will spark an idea for a training solution. That’s all there is to it.

This blog is divided into two categories: Training and Development and Customer Service. It was written for three reasons:

1. I’ve trained in customer service as have many of you

2. I’ve lived through many of its technological changes, (not improvements I said) as many of you, and finally,

3. I’d like to see some new changes, including putting the personal touch back into customer service.

So, if you’re looking for a training solution, look no further. There you have it. Persuade employers not to take the simplest, most efficient technological route. The customer first mindset requires people to contact, as well as the right people to contact.

Customer service can make or break a company. It’s not so easy these days, with global, faceless conglomerates that frequently have so many happy customers in so many countries that the principals wouldn’t know who they were or care. The loss of one or two loyal customers is insignificant. As a result, excellent customer service isn’t all that important. It could be making a comeback thanks to social media. Instead of one person telling ten of his or her friends about disappointed rising customer expectations, we have one person telling hundreds, and hundreds telling hundreds. But that’s beside the point…

Technology has made it possible to make customer service easier and, in some ways, more efficient. Some argue that technology is ideal for making all customer loyalty easier and faster. Those are the people who want basic information but don’t want to talk to a real person and, oh, are probably computer savvy. I believe that technology is best for employers who want to provide cost-effective customer service while giving the impression of excellent service. According to their muddled definition of customer service, it does the job adequately.

Before automation, probably 90% of calls to call centers were for basic information questions that didn’t require a person to look up; an early example would be a bank teller and an ATM. We still use bank tellers if we need a more complex answer than the ATM provides. Of course, that is the most basic form of an automated system. 10% of those calls were more complicated and required a person to assist in resolving the issue; this is when you went into the bank to see the teller or someone else.

Customer service used to make or break businesses. It’s not so easy these days, with the worldwide, faceless conglomerates who often have so many customers in so many contries, the principals wouldn’t know who they were or care. The loss of one or two customers is no big deal. So customer service is not that important. Perhaps, it’s making a comeback with social media. Instead of one disappointed customer telling ten of his or her friends, we have one person telling hundreds, and hundreds telling hundreds. But that’s not important…

Technology has brought us a long way to making customer service easier, and in some ways, more efficient. Some would say technology perfect for making it easier and faster for all for all customers. Those people would be the ones who want to know basic information and don’t want to talk to a real person, and, oh, are most likely computer savvy. I would say technology is best for the employer who wants customer service to be cost effective while giving the impression of having great customer service. In corporate minds it does the job adequately, according to their mixed up definition of customer service.

Probably 90 percent of the calls that came into a call center before automation took over had to do with basic information questions that don’t need a person to look up; an early example would be a bank teller and an ATM. We still use bank tellers though if we have a more complex answer than is offered by the ATM. Of course, that is an automated system at its most basic. Ten percent of those calls were more complicated and needed a person to help resolve the issue; that would be when you went into the bank to see the teller or someone else.

Advance to more sophisticated automated systems, where a human or human-like voice (the first ones were a little frightening) asks you what you need help with. We’ve all been there—some just to pay the bills. In some cases, a real person (a representative) will assist you, but only after you’ve jumped through a million hoops. Be thankful that you aren’t immobile, verbally or physically handicapped, or simply move more slowly or are less agile than you were 20 years ago, because you won’t be able to get help unless you can communicate with someone. Today’s online and automated phone customer service caters to people aged twenty to sixty. The rest can’t do it on their own.

It’s bad enough when the customer journey has done everything the machine has told him or her to do and none of the categories even comes close to what the question or concern is, and there’s no way to talk to a person unless you know the secret. If a customer complaints is particularly clever or savvy with these types of systems (practice helps, and we’re getting there), they can punch “0” and speak to a human. Not always, but occasionally. Customer satisfaction, on the other hand, is frustrated and angry by the time they speak with someone. They had been confused and mildly upset for about half an hour before that.

When customers get past Automaton Lucy, they are referred to the department after department, again and again, to repeat the same identification information in order to verify them as genuine customers on the account, the issue or question if it fits the pre-programmed model, only to be told there is nothing the Frequently Asked Questions spoken verbally can do.

The customers request to speak with the manager due to poor customer service. “It’s company policy,” the manager says. I can do better. I can improve on a couple of things. It is a policy that allows the company thirty days to hold the customers’ money that they withdrew from their account in error; the fact that it was an error on the part of the company does not qualify for expedited service to refund the cash sooner.

Policy is the responsibility of the company, not the people. It is not a legal requirement. It is adaptable in that it can be bent, ignored, or applied on an individual basis. Is it bad for business to abuse it or not use it all the time? Is it there to benefit the company from the loopholes it creates? If it’s company policy to wait or hold something, it’s usually money in a bank account. Right. Interest.

What else is there to keep? Paperwork. Who wants to keep track of something like that? However, money is electronic and in our account, where it earns interest—especially when combined with a large amount of other money in the account.

What does that policy entail? It is never explained, nor are the expedited service rules. No, but this particular case, which took a week to investigate, does not meet the criteria for expedited service. What exactly does expedited service entail? Let us see… a phone call. We don’t use phones much anymore in business. It’s most likely an email. Make a payment to so-and-so. Here’s the account number and balance. Remember how the folder had been sitting on his or her boss’s desk for a week without being expedited?

(1)The real problem here is that policies are not laws. My wife is a lawyer who also happens to be the chief of a police department. She would understand the difference between a policy and a law. For that matter, I would as well.

The slick company’s customer service is the best—it is the most efficient, and Marc Antony’s speech about Brutus being an honorable man is also accurate. Calling customers back in record time by several different customer service agents to give them the same answer and argue with them over a policy point to demonstrate your company’s responsiveness does nothing but enrage them. Especially when a customer support team policy does not count for customer retention. The old adage that if a customer is treated poorly, he will tell ten of his friends no longer applies. The involvement of customer interactions in social media can multiply those numbers exponentially. And if they have a popular blog. Oops.

Who gives good

Who nowadays provides good customer service? Businesses that live and die by word of mouth, successful retail stores, restaurants—particularly good servers in the United States—who make the majority of their money on tips, virtually any successful mom-and-pop business that relies on face-to-face commerce, and large successful corporations and businesses that understand that people are the reason they exist. Some of the obvious ones, such as Disney, USAA, Ben and Jerry’s, and motion picture studios, have probably always done it because the customer factor is right in their face.

Who doesn’t understand? Multinational corporations, large businesses, and small businesses (yes, ordinary businesses and some mom-and-pop shops) that prioritize the bottom line do not. There are also compartmentalized businesses in which one part of the company is unaware of what the other is doing. They’ve become disoriented. They risk jeopardizing their bottom line because they have forgotten about their customers. Some devoted customers even purchase stock. Some people change their minds.

There are those bottom-feeder companies that have salespeople rush measure-quality-customer-experience people to buy products or services in order to get rich. When something goes wrong, they have little flexibility and use policy to get their way, hoping to appease customers with their slick “we’ll get back to you immediately” form of customer service; they use “policy” liberally to resolve most customer service problems, effectively making it the customers’ fault.

My job as a customer service regional representative for five states and the District of Columbia was to “assist” state offices where customer service team efforts had failed, or so the customer empathy thought. And my boss expected me to solve the problem whether the customers were positive or negative. It was my responsibility to be the voice of reason with the support teams.

With no real power to make changes to a client’s case as is the case with most customer service people at that level, I had to hand it off to someone who did. To work with my counterparts in the “company” and the client, I had to use–what’s that word: charisma? I say it in all modesty, of course. The penthouse executives regarded the

With no real authority to make changes to a client’s case, as most customer service representatives do at that level, I had to delegate it to someone who could. To collaborate with my colleagues in the “company” and the client, I needed—the what’s word?—charism? Of course, I say it modestly. The customer with a problem was regarded as an annoyance and an unpredictability by the penthouse executives. Is what happened to the customer always correct? That could solve the problem almost every time without a hitch.

The state and local reps didn’t work for me because I was a regional rep. As a result, the job had a double-whammy effect on me. I had to research a problem that other customer service representatives had already researched, ask my contacts at the State level (perhaps they are slightly higher than the State reps themselves), and provide an answer to clients; if nothing else could be done, I still had to find out why. As I previously stated, policy alone was insufficient. I was frequently asked to explain why the state of national office had that policy. That was sometimes enough, but most of the time when a policy affects someone personally, and customers deserve it, the policy is still just a policy for the convenience of the company, with room for exceptions.

What I could do was get my company’s president or the national rep to speak with the program’s state representatives. Sometimes the mere mention of that action resulted in an exception, other times it did not. Charisma was important. One could hope that my charges liked me more than they feared the unknown. I prefer to imagine the former. Unless the customers’ problem with us is so serious that it warrants extensive media coverage, I doubt my company’s president or even one of her significant vice presidents would have gotten directly involved in the first place.

Unfortunately, the rooms at the top are frequently focused on money columns rather than people’s needs. I frequently developed relationships with clients because I tried numerous avenues; not that others hadn’t done the same; however, I was the end of the road for them. If it was a money problem or a problem that caused a lack of funds at a critical time, I was attempting to solve a problem that had a significant impact on their lives.

We appear to have lost sight of the true definition of customer service and what our interactions with customer expectations mean to us. My training question is, who told them that customer service was only about saving money and giving answers—to hell with customers? I’m not sure, and I’m not interested. I’d kick some butt over it if I could.

Be truthful. Don’t you despise automated customer service phone lines or being directed to a company website (some now have chat groups) when you have a complicated real-world question? Sometimes the only way out of the automation prison is to hang up the phone. Otherwise, you’ll go round and round. Bottom line: a machine cannot change an answer that you have already received, such as a billing problem. In any case, not yet. If you read one of my recent blogs, you might see it in the near future.

Customers not only define our products, but they also define how we conduct business and, in some cases, whether we continue to exist. The latter was more prevalent in smaller businesses. They don’t now, but they should. If only customers could go viral…

Happy Training.

For more resources about training, see the Training library.

For more on Jack Shaw, check his home site, where you can find access to other publications, including a fantastic novel called, Harry’s Reality.

We all know bad customer service when we see it. It makes us frustrated and angry. It’s been known to ruin days, weeks, months, years, holidays–even Christmas. I’ve got a story to illustrate what I mean.

This story is true. I won’t use any names in order to protect the individuals involved. I will, however, give “honorable mention” to the companies that deserve it–good or bad.

A friend and his wife, Bob and Carol, were approached by the same company company that holds their current mortgage, Green Tree Servicing: Home Loan Services, Mortgage Modification. The original mortgage had been held by an online bank, USAA: United Services Automobile Association. The online bank has a huge exclusive membership for veterans, military members and dependants, and are the good guys in the story. I suspect the couple was approached by Green Tree as they were by many refinancing companies because the couple had never missed a mortgage payment, despite having tight resources, even after Bob retired from the government. Ironically, Green Tree owned the loan now.

Green Tree offered lower interest rates, which would have been more tempting had the couple’s taxes on their house not been so high. Bob and Carol filled out the paperwork post haste because they were getting ready to take the family on a long-awaited cruise–one that had been over a year in the planning.

In filling out the paperwork, the couple spotted a red flag. One document stated that if the closing took place by such and such date, the couple were locked at particular interest rate, but the company would not be locked in at that rate after a later date. It sounded as if the couple, with no control of the closing date, were still bound to take the loan if Green Tree could manage the closing by a certain time that the company was not bound by the locked in rate the couple had agree. The company refused to budge or re-write the paper. Although it sounded fishy, but since no mortgage would take place without their signature on other documents signed at closing, the paperwork went forward.

Green Tree, the refinancing arm, through its broker, did some other fishy things in asking Bob and Carol to find the original paperwork from USAA that sold the initial mortgage to Green Tree. But they already had the mortgage. Yes, the old mortgage was owned by the same company that wanted to refinance it. Bob called the bank. USAA as much as said, “That’s absurd. That information had been sent and submit to Green Tree at the time of the previous and that Green Tree would have to pull it themselves. The customer could ask Green Tree for it. Okay, maybe lazy or slick, but not totally fishy. Just a bit much to ask.

This, however was not the big problem. It was the beginning of an unhappy customer service relationship with Green Tree. Of course, what did the care care after the deal was done? Compartmentalization. The only person who had any face-to-face with the couple was the closer hired from out Green Tree. It seemed the company distanced itself as far as possible from the customer.

Understanding their financial situation was tight, and needing cash for the cruise and bills automatically paid while they were gone, Bob and Carol asked the broker numerous and questions on the phone to ensure that there would be cash in their account in November. The mortgage broker said, “No problem, we’ll take care of you with no costs at closing, and no November mortgage payment. So you’ll be all set for your cruise.”

Bob called his bank before they left on the cruise to ensure a mortgage payment wasn’t expected to be received by the bank and it wasn’t. As far as he and the bank were concerned he did not have an automatic payment through his bank on the old or the new as yet. And, this is all happening a day or two within closing and the trip.

Papers all signed October 30 or 31st. November 1st: Day of the flight to Florida to catch the cruise, Carol goes to buy some necessities for the trip and get cash. Her card is turned down and account frozen. The mortgage payment came out, as well as all the extra expenses in preparation for the cruise that had been spent, thinking that money would be there, including the money for dog sitter.

Thanks to Green Tree, Bob and Carol’s rest of the day before their vacation could only be characterized by two words: it sucked. Not only was there a mad scramble to get all the packing done, there were extra phone calls to be made, extra problems to be solved and a somewhat unrelated event, one of the dogs appeared to have seizures. Fortunately, the dog sitter, who had vet technician experience, was available to come early and see the dog was looked after and treated. The trip plan was to leave right after the kids came home from school. As it was, they barely made it to the airport on time. Bob and Carol found out after the cruise that the check for their dog sitter who came to their aid in an emergency bounced.

Before they left Bob called the bank again and discussed the situation. The bank agreed to unfreeze the account, move savings and extend their debit card limit so they could have some cash. The bank even said, he could stop payment, which would allow time for an investigation, but was really a delaying measure. The damage had already been done. USAA note the problem in the account and when it was all over would remove all bank charges for overdrawn checks, etc. The bank didn’t have to do that, or even believe the couple’s situation, but it did; USAA had a lifelong customer.

Carol called Green Tree. No answer. No machine. She went to the web site and found a comment section for customer service and aired her concerns and displeasure with what had happened.

Fortunately she had used other credit cards for purchse, ship costs, etc; she wanted to use cash for any excursions or souvenirs. The cash the family had left was quite limited, therefore, their activity off-ship was limited by the uncertainty of their account.

Upon return from probably not the best vacation they had ever had, there was one call from Green Tree with a message saying the company would look into issue (this from the comment section and get back to the couple as soon as possible. The next day in the mail. They received a letter that stated that since there were no unusual circumstances (not defined) to warranted it the company would return the mortgage amount via check 30 days from the day of the erroneous withdrawal.

Bob called Green Tree customer service after receiving the letter, since it was the company’s error, and was told it is policy to hold the checks. Customer service’s respond: he was being rude, to be quiet and let them finish telling him the same “standard language” he had heard before. But he hadn’t called anyone names or threatened anyone so they didn’t hang up. He did hang up. Later that evening, customer service called again with a different voice but the same answer: It is policy. He hung up on that phone call, too. And, Bob’s not a hang up the phone kind of guy.

It’ll be an interesting Christmas for Bob, Carol and family as they get their finances back in order. They’ll continue living, where not only taxes are high, but also mortgages. They’ll survive. They won’t have to go homeless. Others don’t have it so well. It’s still sad to think that this company because it was “responsive” however late, thinks that it’s customer service is great. I was a hands-on customer manager as well as a trainer; there are exceptions for policies. This might have been a good time for one. Bob told one of his ten, me, and I’m telling you.

Responsive and slick doesn’t equate to good customer service. USAA is a big company, possibly bigger than Green Tree and a customer has to jump through many security hoops to get through to a person, but when you do, they’ll even call the customer back. The company gets great marks for being people-oriented. Personally, I still hate jumping through the hoops like anyone else, but banks like USAA are safeguarding my money, so it’s necessary; I’m still a person. By the way, I almost forgot something very important. No one in Bob and Carol’s customer service contacts said, “I apologize for the mistake,” or “I’m sorry that happened to you.” The latter even takes the blame off the company.

Earlier before the trip, Carol had left a furious message for the broker, which he could have ignored; his job was done. He hadn’t received until the couple and family left. He called back and said, “I apologize for the mix-up. I don’t know how it happened. I am so sorry this happened to you. Are you going to be alright? I want to see if I can fix this.” And he promised to do what he could, but it was a big company, he admitted, and it was hard to get to the right people. Oh, so true.

Bob and Carol, who had already been through corporate hell. Bob answered for the both of them and said: thank you for just say acknowledging us. I doubt the company will change their mind, but if the couple can get the check earlier that would help, but what’s done is done.

Had Green Tree been a bank, they would have withdrawn all their funds and moved on. Another business would lose their business. The perceive fishy business in the beginning was forgotten all with a thank you. Recognizing the difficulty the situation caused so close to a vacation, where no one would be reachable, and followed by the holidays was survivable for Bob and Carol who had lived on the edge before. It would be unconscionable for someone with less means to juggle credit cards and recover financially.

So, while we train world class customer service, let’s not forget the basics. It’s not about cost cutting. It’s about serving customers. We make products they told us they need and not to cancel. We develop and provide services they want. We refine all of the above based on their feedback. Do we want to throw it all away. Without customers, businesses die and without businesses, we die.

Remember, policy is not a law. Policy can be bent or exceptions made. It’s not like a customer who needs an exemption is going to go tell everyone and make the company go broke; it’s one happy customer who’s going to say good things.

Put people who care about people back in customer service.

• Customer service reps are champions of the people.
• A customer service representative is a company ambassador who always puts his or her best side forward.
• Customer service reps are problem solvers, not policy wonks.
• Customer service reps maintain your company’s good name and reputation.
• Customer service reps are among your smartest, savvy initiators of change.
• Good customer service people don’t need standard language and have good communication skills.
• Good customer service reps speak the language of the country they serve fluently, and can easily be understood.
• Good customer service reps are charismatic, are not judgmental, and do not put company or colleagues down.

Be honest. Don’t you hate automated customer service phone lines or being referred to a company web page (some have chat groups now) when you have complicated real question to ask? Sometimes there is no way out of the automation prison, but to hang up. Round and round you go otherwise. Bottom line: a machine can’t change an answer you’ve already received, i.e., a billing issue. Not yet anyway. Read my last blog and you’ll see it can.

Not only do customers define our products, they define how we conduct business, and sometimes whether we continue in business. The latter was more the case in terms of smaller companies. Not so much now, but they should. If only customers go viral…

As luck would happen, or compartmentalization, Bob answered the phone less than a week later and someone from Green Tree was trying to sell insurance on Bob and Carol’s major household appliances and valuable items. You could say, Bob was less than receptive. He didn’t get angry. He simply said, “This would not be a good time to talk to us.” There was double meaning in what he said, but there was no point in taking his grief out on an innocent employee.

Carol received word at work from Green Tree customer service team is indeed possible some twenty days after being told it wasn’t. So, in the end Green Tree came through. I’m not one to beat a company when it is down. There could be a number of reasons why it took so long to resolve the issue.

Resolving the issue is only one aspect of great customer service. Response time can be great. Providing instant basic detain can be great. Solving the problem can be great. But without compassion and flexibility and people on the front end who can adjust policy accordingly, the customer service will only be coated with Teflon. Here it appears compartmentalization or “company gigantism” and diversification may have lead to the series of missteps and miscommunications with serious financial concerns. Again, we come back to: what looks good in the strategic plan and follows a great vision can be missing a critical element. In customer service, that element is the customer itself.

Happy training.

For more resources about training, see the Training library.

For more on Jack Shaw, check his home site, where you can find access to other publications, including a fantastic young adult science fiction/dystopian novel called, In Makr’s Shadow.