Colin Stokes, the MD of adiuvo; looks at Customer Complaints and how it can be a positive process.
We have previously discussed many facets of customer service and dealing with difficult callers and situations but, bearing in mind this issues focus, when a complaint is received how should you deal with it.
We view complaints via the lens of “The right customer is always right”. It is, in our opinion, vital to realise that no matter how much you wish to amaze, please and retain every customer it is not possible as all are not a good fit and occasionally complaints are a very good trigger to realise this. A professional ending of a relationship is better than a slowly deteriorating one that causes a resource and revenue drain.
Once we are reviewing an actual complaint the first question we always ask is “were we at fault?” – it is very easy to immediately proceed on the basis of placating the complainant with fully investigating the cause and it is easier, perhaps, to admit fault and offer a fix to avoid confrontation but we have learnt that nothing good comes of doing this as it merely encourages further issues. You should not be afraid to confidently advise when an issue was not of your team’s causing even if this can elongate the process its important to stand up for your organisation when you have done nothing wrong.
We always like to be transparent in these articles and here will be no different; on average we receive around 30 complaints a month from both end users/residents and our clients the property managers. This may sound like a lot however it represents 0.16% of all calls received and we are proud of that figure even though it can always be improved. That said each is taken seriously and reviewed and, again on average, around 20% are disputed leaving around 25 errors or issues a month.
So when we reach this point what do we do and more importantly what can we learn?
Firstly, like in a lot of Property Management related complaints it depends from whom the issue originates ; the resident or the client? If a resident raises an issue then we like to follow a set complaints procedure including;
- Advising of the time scale for a reply
- (checking with client they are happy for us to address)
- Outlining the investigation and our findings
- Giving a point of escalation should the recipient not agree with our decision.
With property managers our approach is similar but in a less official way and usually involving more open discussion of what we did (our reporting provides a step by step precis of any action we did or did not take)
In today’s market any service-based business that process is not just good practice but necessity, ensuring each and every complaint is addressed in the same manner helping build trusted relationships via open and honest discussions.
Once the complaint is completed to the satisfaction of the parties involved we believe this is where the positive aspect of the complaints process and handling comes into play IF the organisation asks itself what they learned and how they can improve.
The way complaints are perceived is crucial, and if done so positively the opportunity to examine any part of its processes, objectively and from the customers point of view is probably the best feedback any organisation will ever receive. Its just up to you what you do with that information.
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