My company is a staunch advocate of employee empowerment; it adds to the morale and efficiency of an organization. A recent issue with an on- line retailer took one month and a lot of phone calls to reach a basic decision, customer service wasn’t going to do anything more than what they wanted to do. The Executive Management was contacted and got the issue resolved, but in the end the company lost me as a customer.
It has to be asked, when does empowering employees to make a decision become a negative value for the company? To answer this question, four areas of customer contact we looked at.
Does Involving Lower Level Staff Solve the Problem or Make it Worse?
Most customers that complain want the company to realize the inconvenience of the situation, first and foremost and to fix it secondly. As a customer the responsible party is irrelevant, the situation just needs to be resolved in a reasonable amount of time without too much fuss. As a business owner, the expectation is for customer service to fix the situation without too much fuss and for the customer to be happy. If a customer has to call twenty times and repeat the situation to different customer service agents, that’s a lot of fuss. If a customer talks to agents who can only give a discount of 10%, but can’t fix the problem that’s making the situation worse. If staff are empowered the customer should not be blocked, the problem should be solved.
Is an Escalation Process in Place or Do Employees Use Empowerment to Block Customer Contact?
When customers call in or stop by with a problem make sure they know where to go. If they are in the wrong place, show them where to go or offer to transfer them without having to ask. When the customer is not reasonably satisfied, give them options. Ask how they would like the situation resolved and try to do it. Make sure that staff approaches complaints with a customer centric focus. A disgruntled customer with a wonderful complaint process becomes one of the biggest advertisers.
Is The Goal to Keep the Customer or to Solve the Problem?
During this on-line retailer situation,the escalation ladder was climbed as high as expected and the answer received was “we’ve done all we can, there is nothing else that we can do’. This phrase should banned from the customer service realm. If a review shows that staff routinely stonewalls customer complaints, review the operational purpose of the customer service team. What is the ultimate customer service goal? Is it preferable to learn from mistakes? Is a specific after sales experience expected for customers?
How Far is Staff Allowed to Go to Solve the Situation?
Before staff are given the green light to solve customer complaint issues, be very clear as to what situations they are allowed to solve and how much authority they have. This clarity allows staff to actively solve customer issues with the knowledge of how far they can go. When the staff reaches its limits be sure that they know where to escalate the situation to and how to inform the customer. Once staff knows how the situation will be resolved, the customer will too. It is quite possible that the situation can be diffused with a plan of action.
The bottom line is without customers there is no business. While some customers have made a second career out of complaining, the vast majority buy products because of what it is or what it does. If the quality is not there, own up to it and try to fix it; customers will thank the business with their loyalty.
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