Service is Thanks Less job!

Those who have established their careers in customer service know very well as, ‘Service is Thanks Less Job!’ The statement is truer in the field of after sales service. Actually when a product doesn’t function properly and customer faces lack of fill up of his or her expected demand from it during emergency or regular time of life what mostly helps them to lose their control on anger and insists to come respective company service center with gloomy face! At this situation, service staffs get the chance to show their skill to handle angry customer following three P tools, i.e. Polite, Patience & Practical. 

It’s a common scenario that the customer who already got previous several times happy service for various products at various times, but when a new product of him or her needs service generally he or she forgets previous happy service moments and most of the times gets busted into anger for present need. At this situation service person have to be more practical taking on demand decision to keep control inner patience showing polite behavior with customer saluting maximum respect. As a result service person can win the heart of customer. 

Most of the service professionals have the experience to be rebuked by management or customers for single service issues though they have already ensured happy services for a lot of thousands customers. It’s a hard truth. Especially in economic dull season when sales team fall in a deep pressure to achieve sales target of products, usually that time they blame after sales service as one the reasons to miss sales target though most of time, after investigation, generally one or very few actual service issues are found among thousands of happy services what’s ratio is truly negligible. 

 Whatever the situation is duty is duty. Responsibility should not be avoided. A real professional honest hearten customer service professional should not wait for ‘Thanks’ always. If he or she can complete his or her task as per customer’s expectation then there will be no lack of ‘Thanks’ in life!

Customer Service || Importance of System Automation

Now-a-days system automation is a must need to make our life easy. In customer service it’s also mandatory to run operation through automated system. The system should be incorporated in such a design as to cover end to end communication. It means from starting as customer complaint receiving to service delivery including invoice generation, inventory management, billing and ending happy calling to customer to get service review to find development area. There are lots of developed tools in this world to be used in order to do system automation and big data management. Server based ERP (Enterprise resource planning) is mostly used. But now cloud based ERP system is being popular those have various modules including sales, service, accounting, billing, logistics, compliance etc. The company or team who can actually utilize properly ERP with a most user friendly, accurate and transparent design, have possibility to win customer faster than that of others. If CRM (Customer relationship management) module is integrated in used ERP with expected customer, product, parts etc data flow than system automation may be successful easily. Customer service data is very important to create a long time relationship with customer and service data is one of the best sources of product and service development. So it’s very clear to us that in customer service system automation plays top important role.

Customer service || the role of head of service

In customer service the role of head of service is such a vital along with burning coordinating position where management expectation, sales expectation, audit expectation, SCM expectation, Factory expectation, SQA expectation, QC expectation, R&D expectation, Accounts expectation, Finance expectation, IT expectation, operation expectation, Technology expectation, Call center expectation, Marketing expectation, Product expectation, others relevant stakeholders’ expectations and definitely customers’ expectation merge together. No doubt it’s a challenging functional position as at a time to satisfy all stakeholders is really tough. But responsibility is responsibility where no other option than trying continuously to solve customer complaints! Logically head of service should be a strategically position whose main work would be focused on planning & designing rules and regulation with proper synchronization with budget and to motivate teams targeting company profit. In customer service sometimes some decisions are to be on demand based. So in practical, head of service has to engage in work not only in strategic level but also in operational work. Obviously that’s a loaded duty! A passionate, practical and cool brained customer focused strong leader can be successful as a head of service if he can manage good correlation with all stakeholders showing always positive attitude. Otherwise, the position may be turned to a dangerous position to be ashen anytime!!

Customer service || Important KPI RTAT improvement

 

One of the most important KPI in customer service is RTAT or TAT. RTAT refers to Repair Turn Around Time. It can be addressed as TAT (Turn Around Time) also. As a definition, we can say that it is the time it takes you to complete any given task or proper repair work. Obviously the quicker you effectively solve an issue, the sooner you can move on to the next issue.

RTAT or TAT is one of the most important KPI in customer service to judge after-sales service or relevant customer service of any company or band or organization considering negligible repeat jobs.

In customer service effective and efficient reduction of RTAT or TAT resembles that customer service team is working with continuous improvement targeting to gain a happy experience of customers.

Recently in Bangladesh, the customer service team of Butterfly Marketing Limited (LG-Butterfly) has shown remarkable improvement in RTAT. Definitely, their management and team deserve Big Thanks for this development journey.

Year	RTAT (day)
2018	13.40
2019	7.37
2020	3.31

Honesty in customer service || importance & impact on business

We all know that honesty is the best policy what has highest importance in relation building whatever the field is personal or professional or even in commercial. Globally long lasting brands are always in trying to keep promise to customer in terms of product quality and after sales service as they know customer’s faith plays vital role on business growth. So there is no doubt of importance & impact of honesty in customer service targeting to keep positive & influential business strategy.

First impression is the last impression. So when a service person is going to attend to ensure a service job to customer premises, he/she must keep promise to reach there in time. If there is any unwanted situation, i.e. traffic jam, previous job completion delay etc. occurs, and then true situation must be escalated to customer in apologized tone.

Service provider agent or executive or technician must be honest to do actual service billing mentioning actual service charge & parts price as designed by company. Here any type of discrepancy is a serious disciplinary offense.

Sometimes customer complaints to call center as his/her problematic product’s after sales service cost goes higher than present price of similar finished good product. Renowned bands are very much conscious about this complaint. After sales service and parts price should be designed in such a way as company will not be financially loser and customer must be happy and can keep trust on used brand.  

After service product delivery should be done on time as customer expects to get back his/her full functional product after facing unexpected difficulties in usual daily life. So service team should not let customer to be disheartened. They must be good to their word. If there is any unexpected possibility of delay reason appears then it must be portrayed to customer before delivery date that will help customer to keep patience.  

Expected professionalism of customer service enriches trust of customers on their used brands. As a result company can get a fixed mind setup of customer in fever of their product. Definitely then company can expect positive business growth.

At the end we can say that honesty, customer service, brand image and business growth go together hand to hand.

Customer service || Sales VS Service Conflicts

Sales VS Service style conflict is a globally practiced essential battle, in business, what should be in a certain level of severity always as it has some positive as well as negative aspects. If it is positively used then products and service quality can be upgraded. On the other side, if this battle crosses the limit from virtually to reality then a good market of a company can be destroyed. Considering universal practice as Sales VS Service style conflict, combined action exploring proper information flow, ethics & responsibilities to be taken in order to satisfy all stake holders targeting a happy ending!

Many customers call service center with a common complaint as when sales person sold a product or service to them, they promised to them for enormous facilities or discount from customer service though those facilities or discount process actually service department doesn’t follow!

A true sales person should not do such unethical practice though he/she may fill up sales target for the time being by this unacceptable practice, but for long run he or she will lose the faith of customer forever and company will fall in decrement of goodwill.

In order to avoid similar unexpected situation, sales and customer service should have a good communication and must be aware of each others’ limitations and scope of support. They must have proper documentation and direct contact for the responsible sales person who sold the service or product. Also they must be joined together as a big team, instead of separating two departments in different rooms, which can minimize conflicts and misunderstandings.

Sometimes sales team claims that, for a single after sales service issue, they are losing huge customers. Hearing this type blame management may become very rude to service. Normally service is a thankless job, when management and sales both create such unexpected pressure on service then positive speed of work may be hampered. This type of direct blaming from sales has no positive outcome unless company growth decrement. Both sales & service must have to avoid such type of illogical blaming practice. They have to feel depth of responsibilities & honor each other with a cooperative mind.

Service team should keep their mind setup in such a way of taking every negative issue as opportunity of work in order to make it positive.  

Note that, whatever the conflicts arises, first of all customer service must be ensured then other internal practices of company should be deployed as there is no other way of thinking as customer is the king.

Customer Service || Top five qualities to be practiced to be good customer service manager

Actually in practical globe most successful business conglomerates and MNC have given highest priority to ensure expected customer service. It is the field where success depends on a total team work. Among the team customer service manager is the biggest catalyst. This catalyst can reach highest pick of happy customer experience if the role is being sharpen by following top five qualities to be good customer service manager.

Customer-Centric Behavior:

Manager must be customer centric. From salutation to service ending of a customer, manager along with total team have to keep in center of their mind the need of customer. Customer centric behavior is the first condition to be good customer service manager.

Influential Communicator:

In customer service nothing is important than influential communication. Manager must be cool in hearing, smiley in speech delivery and of course be passionate in team management. As good customer service manager can create opportunity of sale, so this quality should be practiced effectively.   

Compassion to Burn:

Great manager should have full bucket of this sensitive quality compassion to burn the unhappy feelings of customer. It is needed to solve the difficult customer situations when managers are often called on to resolve and it is also crucial to managing teams.  

Master of Priorities:

Customer service supervisor should be a master of priorities in work balancing among team targeting good customer experience. Manager should know the team strength to execute on time product receive, service & delivery in a segmented time bound designed way to make team and customer both to be happy.   

Positive Motivator:

A service staff can be a good manager when he or she can handle both team & customer in such a way as expected outcome can be obtained. Good managers know how to motivate themselves and motivate their teams in order to create a culture that doesn’t wait for things to happen but that proactively makes them happen. Great managers always try harder themselves and inspire their teams to be looking for how they can make a difference for their customers, their colleagues, and the organization.