Customer Service

[Ken]

Hi,

Early morning discussion to see what your opinions are on customer service.

Is it me or is customer service painfully poor and frustrating in general. I'd say 9/10 companies provide poor service. The 1/10 being the gem leaving you with peace of mind and possibly going beyond the call of duty.

By poor service it could be...

- Talking to some muppet over the phone or face to face who only had basic training provided by monkeys...sorry, trainers. Which leads on to...

- Talking to said muppet who doesn't know what they're talking about.

- The customer subsequently has to educate him.

- Here's a real pet hate...When you have to fight for not what you want but what you're entitled to.

- Don't you hate it when there's a lack of consistency.

- Compensation offered can really take the **** too.

In my opinion, customer service is shoddy across the board, whether it be insurance, ISP, mobile phone contract provider, tradesmen, local supermarket...whatever.

Very few companies I've dealt with know what they're talking about and cut out waffle and get straight to the point. If a job needs doing it should be quick and painless with a little something special so you'll go back to them.

It's good there are regulatory bodies, watchdogs and independent bodies to resolve complaints but they themselves can be useless.

Arghhhh, exhausted typing about it...!

 

[Ken]

Few months back, a female shopper in Sainsbury's asks a store assistant for an item as she can't find it. Predictably, he says "Errr..." and then some useless waffle for the sake of poor customer service and then tells her he will ask his colleague. He asks his female colleague and she thinks she knows which aisle it's on so goes off and will bring it back to the shopper. He says he will check another aisle and therefore avoid the awkward silence that would have developed. Don't think anyone returned to her. Anyway, I rather set myself the challenge and find an item rather be faced with the dreaded "Errr" when I ask someone where I can find it.

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I don't bank in Hong Kong but my mother does with Bank of China. Correct me if I'm wrong but all international customers of the bank are treated as VIPs. I think it's because in general anyone international banking with them will be earning a significantly larger sum then the average Hong Konger. My mother deals with one Bank of China representative and she provides a service closer to that of Natwest Black Card Concierge than the generic service Hong Kong people receive. We're not well off. This is purely a rare example of the excellent customer service she receives.

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I agree with the point made about companies being automatically bad if they employ indian call centres. I always ask to be transferred back to the UK!

 

[Ken]

Dunno if it's the case with all indian call centres but the one I dealt with were scripted like the computers they use and were not willing to offer a resolution to the complaint in the form of compensation. I made the mistake of battling with 2 agents and then 2 managers in relation to my brother's complaint against mobile company 3. should have asked to be transferred to UK but they had no empathy and all they could do was offer a better deal that was no better.

 

[Ken]

I hate the mindset adopted especially in insurance call centres where by they've made a decision (not to your liking of course) and they stick to it. You originally spoke to an agent then a team leader then a customer service manager. They all adopt the same mindset and decision for the sake of consistency and you resort to dealing with customer relations or writing in for the decision to be investigated. Customer service can be so drawn out.

 

[Ken]

I only work in a Café, but I try to ensure I'm not one of these moody customer assistants who doesn't care about their job. As such I've been entered for a Coffee Competition and got a Service Award - Woo!

If everyone adopted that attitude, it'd be brilliant but too many people go to work and count down the hours rather than working their ass off and earning the money that's paid to them at the end of the month.