Contact Center Solutions Featured Article

Contact center managers beware. Thanks to the Internet, bad news about a product or service, including customer service provided by one of their agents, may be known to the whole world in minutes.

The Times-Colonist (in Victoria, BC, Canada) recently reported that chances are increasing that customer service issues will end up reported on the Internet, leading to even quicker-to-realize consequences (lost business), according to academics and customer service experts interviewed.

 

"Whatever the issue is, or the problem is, and whether the experience was bad or good, it now goes from one individual to 100,000 in a couple of seconds," said Francis Mairet, general manager of the Victoria Marriott Inner Harbour.

 

Social networking sites, blogs, online travel clubs and frequent buyer/flyer clubs are both the best friend and worst enemy of many businesses as they extol their virtues for all to hear but can ruin a hard-won reputation with one bad review, reported the newspaper.

 

"It used to be if someone had a bad experience they might have told 10 people about it, “said Steve Tax, economics professor at the University of Victoria (UVic). “Now, if they have a bad experience, it could be that they tell tens of thousands of people in a very efficient manner.”

 

An Ipsos-Reid poll conducted for the Times Colonist and CHEK NEWS, a local TV station, found that 74 per cent of area residents will tell other people when they've had a poor service experience. Seventy percent also said they'd decide not to patronize the business again after a bad experience.

 

Do not expect to hear about these problems directly. The newspaper reported only 47 percent of people will actually complain to the responsible employees or their managers, which means that the other 53 percent may be telling their friends, family — and perhaps the world.

 

The newspaper if anything has underreported the willingness of people to spread the bad news and complain to employees and management; Victoria area residents are laid back and polite even by Canadian standards.

 

Just imagine what the populace of regions long noted for not exactly being shy about letting others know what they think, especially when they are annoyed, such as those who live in the New York City area (full disclosure: the author has lived in Victoria and in New York City). The New York Times published a brilliant article in 1999 about New Yorkers’ responses when they were called by market research firms and telemarketers. It revealed that some contact centers compensate their agents with ‘danger pay’ when they called a New York City exchange.

 

What can enterprises do besides beefing up standard contact center practices: monitoring, recording, training, and supervision?

 

One set of methods reported by the Canadian newspaper is what many firms are already carrying out, such as e-mail forms on their Web sites, customer surveys, and yes through customer service contact centers.

 

Perhaps more importantly is to create and maintain a strong customer service culture that generates loyalty and which in turn makes customers more likely to give firms and their agents the benefit of the doubt and less likely to walk away when things go wrong.

The Times-Colonist story points to WestJet, Canada’s nationwide low-fare air carrier, which has long had a strong and well-known customer service culture.

 

UVic’s Tax says WestJet and other customer service leaders show their frontline staff there are tangible rewards for excellent service that bring in more business. WestJet offers profit-sharing that has paid out $125 million to its staff since 1996."It's based on things like two more people per flight could mean an extra $500 in your bonus a year," Tax said.

 

WestJet’s customer service culture may even help it ride out climbing oil prices that have forced it and its larger competitor Air Canada to institute fuel surcharges to ticket prices.

In announcing the fuel surcharge WestJet Executive Vice-President, Guest Experience and Marketing, Bob Cummings said: "Our low-cost structure and committed, resilient employees enable us to adapt quickly to any change in the external environment. We remain committed to providing the best value for our guests and will continue to seek new and innovative ways to run our airline."