Pat Phelan: Bits, bytes and telecomsMobile, Roaming and Social Media

A plumber who leaves a leaking pipe doesn’t annoy you as much as one that turns up late and doesn’t return your phone calls. A dentist that is concerned at the pain he is causing you is more acceptable than a dentist who isn’t causing you pain but doesn’t care. Being told your flight is cancelled in advance is better than the stress of waiting around with no official communication, unsure whether you’re going to be flying or not.

So why have so many businesses ended up with their priorities the wrong way round? Many of them seem to think that the job they do is more important than the customer service they offer. This is simply wrong. Customer service should always come first because great customer service leads to great products and services, not the other way round.

As customers we all want to feel valued and poor customer care makes us feel that our custom is neither wanted nor valued. It really doesn’t matter how good your service is; if your customer service doesn’t make me feel like the most important person in the room then you’re going to piss me off.

Here’s an example of how a company destroyed any goodwill I had towards them through poor customer service even though they delivered exactly what they promised. I’m a subscriber to UPC’s broadband service, which has always been reliable and everything it promised to be. Last week they sent me a text message telling me that they’d increased my broadband speed from 4Mbs to 8Mbs for free. The problem was that when I checked, it hadn’t been upgraded. The speed test needle was firmly pointed at 4Mbs. So I sent them off an email and two days later I got a response telling me the text was sent in error and I hadn’t been upgraded.I got the impression that they already knew about the problem before I sent my email but hadn’t bothered to proactively inform me of the mistake. As a result all customer goodwill has been lost and when I move house I’m unlikely to use them as my provider.

Surprisingly the corollary to this is also true. You can screw up something awful and if your customer service is top notch you can win a customer for life. For example, 37 Signals (of Basecamp fame) recently double billed me. Now in the grand scheme of things taking someone’s money without their permission is a major screw up and I had every right to be pissed off with them. However, their excellent customer service immediately rescued the situation and turned a negative experience into a position one. How?

Two hours after the double billing event they proactively contacted me. At this point I had seen the double billing but I hadn’t gotten around to complaining yet. The email admitted fault, apologised and remedied the problem. It was simple, to the point, and I felt like they cared and that was all that I needed. As a result I’m now even more loyal to them as a company than I was before.

As a consumer we will forgive nearly anything as long as we aren’t left feeling like we’ve been taken for granted. Value me as a customer and treat me with respect and you’ll have a customer for life.

About The Author

Caelen King is founder and CEO of WhatClinic.com, a seach engine for health clinics worldwide

that has recently expanded into UK Dentist & UK Plastic Surgery markets.