We were lucky enough to have one of the big mobile phone companies as our first client: Connex, now Vodafone.
In the early years, this company placed great emphasis on customer satisfaction. It wasn’t an easy time, especially as people weren’t familiar with signs like #, *, and associated words. I remember that #, was explained as “that sign that looks like a beetle”.
Someone at this firm was telling me at the time that it was important to say if something was not ok, not to our liking, to us, the customers, so they could change, that feedback was very much appreciated there.
The years have passed and, lo and behold, the customer’s voice doesn’t seem as valuable anymore. If you call a healthcare provider, you’re told that your call is very important, then you wait tens of minutes, and eventually, you hang up or the call is cut off.
It’s not the only situation. If your internet contract runs out, you get a call from someone who also offers you a mobile phone subscription, as a package deal, for “only 10 lei for the first two years”. If you say that you only want the internet, you find out that this is not possible, that someone else will call you, possibly because a ‘basic’ package is the responsibility of that agent. Months go by and you get another call with the same offer…
It’s the same with other services. You make an appointment, you put it in your agenda in advance, then you find out two hours beforehand that they can’t make it, that they don’t have a product, or worse, you go there and find out that they forgot. You’d think they’d make a gesture to repair the image, offer you a 2% discount as a token gesture, or anything else to show they care about the customer. Unfortunately, in most cases this is not the case.
Not to mention the shop assistants at the supermarket. I go in, say hello, nothing; I come out, say goodbye, nothing. Have I become invisible to Shop&Go? Do I have a superpower and not know it?
Sometimes I wonder what the strategy is towards the customer now: to encourage them to leave if they don’t like the way you treat them? Aren’t those who put a customer in such situations customers themselves?
There were, some time ago, many books, and many courses, on how to create customers who are not only satisfied but who will recommend you. The gap between that mentality and the one that doesn’t put the customer at the centre is very big. I wonder what these people and these companies are putting at the centre. What is their purpose? How do they hold up in the marketplace? Rhetorical questions, of course, this time of behaviour is not new, it’s just exacerbated now.
I’m not saying we’re not allowed to be wrong. We all make mistakes, we all forget things, we can be clumsy in a relationship with a client. I have clumsiness, no matter how hard I try.
But when these procrastinations, forgetfulness, and sloppiness become the norm, it’s not just unpleasant, it’s disappointing, and disheartening.
The attitude of superiority, je m’en fiche-ism, breathes through the pores of those who fool you. I can get over these attitudes, it’s not about that. But I expect the provider to deliver that service. Maybe I’m being too demanding, but I can count on one hand the suppliers who behave with care towards the customer.
After all, the level of a society is (also) determined by how we behave towards each other.