CUSTOMER SERVICE EXCELLENCE

It's a half day course day today... and the topic is
"CUSTOMER SERVICE EXCELLENCE"

At first I thought I would not blog this course because there would be nothing to write about. I thought this course relies more entirely on your actions, your mentality. And such things are hard to be conveyed through the power of words. However the instructor brought out certain points that are very thought-provoking.

If communication is made up of
1. Words (Literal words e.g. emails, letters)
2. Tone (Speech, Telephone conversation)
3. Body Language (Face to face conversation)
How much percentage will you put for each of them to make up a total of 100%?

Research shows that
1. Words = 7%
2. Tone = 38%
3. Body Language = 55%

Thus when you receive an email from a friend, who says he is fine, there is a possibility that he is actually not fine. But you will never know unlike if you face him and ask him how he is feeling.

To provide good service, I concluded that one must
1. Be courteous
2. Listen attentively and ask the right questions
3. Be sincerely compassionate
4. Eager to learn and upgrade
5. Take responsibility and apologise
6. Always thanks the customer for giving their feedback

When you provide quality service, the main aim is you will feel good about yourself. When you see someone’s problem was solved, you will feel happy and accomplished. That is something I realised while supporting my systems. That is something I hear often too from my friend who used to work in call centre.

And if at the end of the day, the customer is still unable to appreciate your kind hospitality, you should not feel put down and demoralised. You should not let this customer darken your day. You should not feel that service staff is taken for granted. And you should not let this feelings affect the next customer that you are facing.

I have always wondered why I end my emails with a Thank you even when a customer was reporting an error. But now I realised that I had subconsciously be doing the right thing because I was indeed grateful for the customer for highlighting the error. Afterall it is true that majority of the dissatisfied customer will never highlight to you the problem. They will only tell another 9 of their friends that your service is substandard.

To conclude, I have indeed benefited from this course. Haha afterall I committed 4 hours there, have to get something out of it right. And it does teach me how to give VIP treatment to my internal and external customers without incurring much cost..