Customer Service Processes – Companies Still Don't Get It!

By Derrick Strand

A key component of customer loyalty is how well a company handles complaints. I have a fresh example to illustrate! I bought a top of the line, king size memory foam mattress six months ago and it already has a lump in the middle. It has a 15 year warranty on it so I called customer service. They are sending out a third party to determine if there is a defect which is fine.

The customer service representative then informed me that if the mattress is defective and needs to be replaced, there is a $50 charge that I must pay for them to deliver the new one and take away the defective one. I told her that doesn’t make sense that I would have to pay a delivery charge for their defective mattress. She calmly and politely informed me that in the small print of the agreement that I signed, it clearly stated that I was responsible for these charges if the mattress was defective. I didn't check the small print but I’m sure it is there.

I’m not sure what occurred in their customer service process design meetings (if there were any) but they were obviously looking at the process from an internal, short term financial point of view. The cost to deliver goods was to be passed on to the consumer...for their defect!!

Although this may satisfy a short term financial metric, it fails miserably on the longer term, more critical metric, customer satisfaction. I believe there is a simple solution that satisfies both metrics. They could deliver the new replacement mattress free of charge (what a concept!).

This satisfies the customer who is upset that the product was defective but at least the company stands by their product and makes the replacement as positive of an experience as possible.

From the financial perspective, a financial analyst could determine the defective mattress rate (for simplicity, lets say one defect for every 50 sold). If the average delivery cost is $50/replacement, then that cost could be spread over every 50 mattresses sold by adding a dollar to every initial delivery or adding a dollar to the sales price. The customer, at the time of sale, could care less if the delivery fee is $20 or $21 or if the sales price goes up a dollar. It would be transparent to them.

The end result is a satisfied customer who would consider buying from the same store again and the cost of redelivery is covered indirectly. The result of their current process is that I will never buy another mattress from them.

They won’t be able to measure that directly but it will show up in future sales since there will be less repeat business over the long term. I know this sounds basic but I am continually amazed at how many companies do not understand customer service and satisfaction.

Some companies just don’t get it and they will pay dearly in the long run!

Consultant, writer and speaker Derrick Strand is not your typical management consultant. Derrick spends most of his time helping companies get rid of him. It is his philosophy that companies have most of the answers already inside of their business and inside the minds of their people. His job is to help them unleash that power to drive bottom line results. For more information, please visit http://www.derrickstrand.com