Customer service today stinks! (Well, DUH!)
However, I recently read about an airline experience (the airline industry is known for horribly poor customer service!) that took customer service to an even “lower low”!
On the last layover before reaching their international destination the air crew informed the 180 weary passengers that the company’s credit had been cut off and they didn’t have enough cash to buy fuel for takeoff! So the airline demanded that the passengers take up a collection of approximately $200 each to pay for the flight’s expenses!
So after a 6 hour ordeal (and many of the passengers making a trip to the airport’s ATM) they finally loaded and took off. Now that’s one BIG dumb glaring example of poor customer service!
However, most customer service mishaps don’t win the “stupid act of the year” award and yet the results are ultimately the same. For example, you (hopefully) will never have such a major public relations disaster in your company. BUT remember that delivering superb customer service isn’t about doing just one thing really bad or even super better than your competitor.
Instead, superb service is created by the little things that add up or are subtracted from your customer’s “emotional bank account”. (These “little things” are either positive or negative Moments of Truths.) Sounds good, huh? HOWEVER, if you don’t take proactive steps to constantly improve your customer service over time it will slowly degrade and ultimately breakdown. Guaranteed!
So how do you teach your frontline technicians the importance of excellent customer service? Easy … you delegate it to third-party professionals that know how to train today’s workforce. In the following video I give an overview about a program that does just this, Jon-Don’s VAST program.
Jeff Cutshall
PS: Questions on VAST? Call me at 816-223-6659 or email me at jeff_cut@sbcglobal.net