Everyone has needed to contact customer service at one time or another. We live in a world where we aren’t heading downtown for our groceries, the mail and the tailor.
Today’s consumer is online, our services are digital and we don’t know our mail person other than the uniform and mail truck.
I have a few tips from an insider in the industry and I would like to share them with you.
1. Be courteous. Seriously. The person on the other end of the line is getting paid to fix your problem not be your punching bag. These are real people with real feelings and emotions.
Customer service agents are not robots.
2. Just like a representative is not a robot they aren’t mind readers. Unless you called the psychic hotline the person you are talking to has not a clue what you need from them.
Explain your problem in a calm and rational manner and wait for the response.
3. Be patient.
While you are waiting on help for your problem keep in mind there are 100 ways to solve said problem and your representative needs to carefully factor all the possibilities. If you are pushing your rep to the point he or she puts you in hold to stop listening to you bitch they have already decided not to be generous. At this point they just want you off the line and you’re getting a hasty resolution … if any.
The power is in their hands.
4. Have faith in those powers.
Customer service exists to solve customer problems. Amazing, huh? If you come at the person on the other line totally unwilling to accept a solution they will be much less inclined to offer you the best one.
See #3 there are many ways your complaint can be handled.
5. Be happy If your complaint is resolved. There is no need to bash the company all over social media after the resolution. Simply put you don’t need to contact your friend Joe at the newspaper to report that a company made an error, especially if they have since corrected said error.
Mistakes happen and if they are corrected should you really be wasting time bashing them some more?
6. Most companies hire professionals to clean up reputations. By leaving a trail of nasty comments everywhere you can only limit any future resolution possibility.
Want to be in their good side? Compliment the service provided to correct the initial problem. You might even score discounts or free stuff.
Really. Free stuff for being NICE.
7. Want to know why you never hear about this free stuff thing? It’s because the only voices yelling are the ones who were dissatisfied. Try shouting about how much you appreciate a company and see what happens. I bet it will be a nice surprise. Not a truck load of free snacks or an envelope of cash from your bank but still. Free cool stuff from places you clearly shop or do business anyway.
So there you have it. Customer service 101 for the customer. It will get you further, faster and it will open doors that would otherwise be slammed in your face.
Whatever you do today remember that those are real people on the other side of your rant. Be nice damn it.
My Idiotic Bliss 
Oh so true! I don’t work in customer service, but I do work on the phone as a telefund caller and because of how irked people get at me, it’s always a relief to be on the phone with someone nice, even if they end up rejecting my donation ask.
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It is always a relief to have someone pleasant on the other line! I deal with customer service on a specialist / management level and I’m always coaching the team to take these calls in a pleasant manner. Really all I want to do is coach the escalated callers on how to get what they really want without being a jerk. That should be a actual profession 🙂
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