Has anyone read John Seddon's book "Freedom from Command and Control"? Although I havent read it, he advocates focussing on the system. The system affects customer service far more than people.

Taking this one stage further is it prevealent that agents are able to change the system? Do we empower them with enough opportunities to change processes?

A case in point; last week a well known telecoms supplier in the UK (think Maureen Lipman) rang me up to see how I was getting on with my broadband connection now that my 12 month contract had ended. I mentioned some honest problems I had with reliability and the appaling new email service they had set up with a partner that required me to jumpt through all manner of obstacles to reregister (this after they'd changed the service). The agent expressed lots of apologies and offered 10% off the bill.
Whilst this may alleviate my dissatisfaction it doesnt solve the problem, probably will never come to the attention of anyone who can improve my service reliability or head of or undo any of the underlying email issues or any future poorly thoguht through tie ups with partners.

Upshot is a simple refund and hope the customer is happy with a mediocre level of service.

Perhaps its me, I'm just a small cog lost in a mass marketing machine but a customer service call that simply pays lip service and offers refunds isnt going to retain my customer loyalty. And therein lies the rub, do your agents have the capabilities to jump/override the system and truly meet customer needs?

You would have prob got a call from a sales or retention agent. Usually these guys are not really bothered abt service issues. They are more inclined to renew your subscription. That would explain them paying less of a heed to your complaints and offering you a discount.

Empowerment is an extremely powerfull tool but it is not used widely due to Finance being sticky abt the dollars. There is just too much accounting at the end of the day and keeping abuse off is another challenge. If you look at the Hotel sector, The Ritz empower everyone of their staff a limit of a 1000 Sing dollars to put things right, no questions asked. That amongst other things explains their level of superior service.

But empowerment alone does not result in Cust Sat. Its a mind set issue.

Ah empowerment is a fearsome word to most dealing in a large customer base and although the agents (in most cases) are empowered to a certain extent the fear in the higher ranks is of the agents giving the shop away.

Now as far as taking care of a particular problem is concerned; the only block in this is the fact that most companies and service providers go by a statistical method to address issues. Which means that something you receive more complaints about are those that are taken care of on a priority basis.

But perhaps with the changing competitive scenario among businesses, we might see a trend setter not afraid to really satisfy a customer.

Now this brings to mind Rolls Royce who refuse to believe that anything could go wrong with their car, so a repair of the car is not only not billed it is also not acknowledged. Now that is customer service but then, you ve got to pay for it.

I totally agree that the agents should be empowered (by providing them some basic guidelines) to make ammends and set things right for the customer. Every organisation wants to provide impeccable service and excellent customer care. Hours are spend behind closed boardroom doors formulating stratergies and budgets for the same. But they all forget its the agent who is the voice of the company and also the first point of contact.

Being polite, excellent communication skills, language fluency will not get you new customers or retain the exisiting ones. While these are the pre-requisite for a wholesome experience, what is needed is to make the customer feel valued by providing solutions to their problems.

Rekha Rodrigues
Service Delivery Manager-UK Operations
India