Good Customer Service - The Exception or the Rule?

There’s a lot of speculation these days about the decline of quality customer service in the U.S. Shadesbreath wrote a great hub about this subject that eloquently expresses a consumer’s perceived experience. I also recommend his forum post on the subject exploring some possible causes of declining quality in Customer Service. I saw a wide variety of opinions expressed there.

One of the proposed theories (paraphrased of course) is that the avaricious capitalists pay crap and therefore can only hire brainless idiots incapable of doing anything more than could be done by a retarded monkey. Another is that the capitalist pigs are too cheap to offer proper training for their employees. The final theory that caught my attention was that customer service representatives are so imprisoned by the financial policies, the “quality metrics”, and cover-your-a$$ procedures of the companies they work for that it is impossible for them to provide good service. These metrics do in fact put constraints on reps that can make it difficult to do what a customer may be asking of them. My short answer to the proposed question is that while the poor customer service experienced in the U.S. can be partially attributed to capitalism, ultimately the blame is to be laid squarely on the shoulders of culture. My longer answer is the contents of this hub.

The average 21^st century American has forgotten the meaning of the words courtesy and service. I’m not talking about the definitions of these words. Those are readily available in any dictionary, in print or online. I see evidence of this almost daily, primarily among people under the age of thirty. No one helps anyone with anything anymore. Putting the needs of another person ahead of one’s own is practically unheard of. I’ve watched as an elderly woman moving at a slow, shuffling pace as she juggles grocery bags, a purse, and her walker in an attempt to board a city bus gets rudely shoved aside by an empty handed teenager trying to get in out of the cold. It doesn’t even occur to this kid that perhaps the woman could use a hand. Maybe holding her bags while she boards the bus would be a helpful thing to do. Maybe allowing her to board the bus ahead of him, because she too has been waiting in frigid temperatures and forty mile per hour winds, is something he should do. It’s not as though an offer of assistance is going to delay his trip. The bus isn’t leaving until everyone has boarded. Would it really take so much out of this kid to let the woman get on ahead of him, and maybe offer some sort of assistance that might make it a little easier for her to do so? Courtesy and service are two sides of the same coin. Sometimes, common courtesy isn’t common at all. Service to another human being has become almost nonexistent.

That being said, when you’re reliving or reviewing a specific customer service experience you’ve been through, stop and think that there were two human beings involved in the situation. One or both of you may be to blame for the unpleasant experience, and it has far more to do with how you each choose to behave than with the fact that the company is a capitalist behemoth. I handle anywhere from seventy-five to one hundred calls in my average shift as a customer service representative. I’ve been doing this type of work for over twenty years, with a three year break thrown in while I studied to become a nun. I am exceptionally good at what I do, and most often I end a call having resolved the issue from which it originated, with pleasant closing remarks. To those who think otherwise, let me clarify that customer service is not an easy job. Occasionally, I come to the end of a day feeling as though I’ve endured eight hours of being kicked in the head by a roughneck in steel-toed boots. Other days aren’t quite so dramatic. For someone new to the industry, a day in customer service can cause more emotions and mood swings than Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde experienced in a lifetime. I’ve watched new reps go home in tears. Many have never returned. There are those who say that the company trains these individuals poorly. Spending the money on quality training would avoid this problem altogether. Let me share an industry secret with you. Huge companies (phone, cable, wireless, etc…) spend a lot of money on training their customer service reps. So, then, what’s the problem? The training is filled with platitudes and clichés. Over the course of my customer service career, I have been inundated by training seminars and manuals that promise to turn me into an empowered and successful consumer advocate. In reality, the training gives great tips about how to handle an issue within a reasonable amount of time (average handle time). It talks about being immediately available to take the next call (speed of answer). And, this training tells you what you can do to “appease” an unsatisfied customer to avoid another call from the same individual (first call resolution). Those are the metrics mentioned in the first paragraph by which customer service quality is measured by the industry. None of the training speaks to situations that may fall outside these metrics. Not one iota of what I’ve learned in training has helped to improve the quality of my performance as a customer service rep. Then why am I exceptionally good at what I do? It’s simply because I do what I’m being paid to do. I serve my customer. I approach each interaction with each customer as a human encounter, not a transaction. I offer the kind of service I would like to receive. Sometimes, that means skirting the rules a bit, maybe even bending one here or there.

I’m not even going to address the issue of automated telephone menus. My concern is the actual person to person interaction that takes place in customer service. I’ve done customer service in retail, in restaurants, and by phone. Each has its own inherent dangers. In telephone customer service, one danger is the assumption of anonymity. The person on the other end of the line is invisible, therefore the customer “sees” him as a non-person. The customer continues his experience with the human being as though he were still hearing the voice of the automaton who greeted him at the beginning of the call. Another danger is repetition. The rep has heard your story before and subconsciously assumes that he can solve your problem, without actually listening to what you’re saying. The combination of these two methods of behavior leads to a miserable customer service experience, for the customer and the rep.

At various points over the last twenty years, I have been insulted by customers. I’ve had them scream profanity at me so loudly that others in my area could clearly understand the words through my headset. I was once told by a man that he knew the address of the building I worked in and was going to bomb it to the ground, after he found me personally and disemboweled me. He had called to say that his payment would be late. As I had been trained to do, I thanked him for letting us know, and advised him that a late fee of ten dollars would be assessed to his account, but that his service would not be interrupted. The threat to disembowel me and blow up the building came as a result of that exchange. I have also heard customer service reps insult customers, hang up on them, or simply blow them off to ensure that they met their average handle time goals. Poor customer service experiences are certainly not weighted more heavily to the consumer than to the customer service rep. As in life, there are always two sides to every customer service story. Well, three, if you choose to count the truth.

Yes, the quality of customer service has declined quite steeply in the 21^st century. Capitalism is not to blame. It is a culture of selfish and demanding individuals that has spawned this decline. Consumers today are all about instant gratification, and getting the most for their money. Fair enough. Customer service reps are all about meeting their stats, conforming to their company’s guidelines, and getting the customer on and off the phone as quickly as humanly possible. Short calls look better on the company’s bottom line for the customer service rep. And, a consumer in today’s society feels wronged when his issue isn’t immediately resolved. After all, why should he waste his time waiting for you to fix something that isn’t his fault? No one in the equation is interested in examining every side of the story and meeting somewhere in the middle to create a perfect ending. That takes too much time! If blaming the customer and refusing to go a few extra steps to resolve the issue gets a customer off the phone in an acceptable amount of time according to company standards, that’s what the average customer service rep will do. If screaming profanity and calling the rep a moron gets him a free service or the credit he called to request, that’s what the average consumer will do. Sadly, this results in a customer service experience that is merely average, not exceptional. Our 21^st century American culture accepts average as the norm. We used to have far higher standards.

In reality, we’ve stopped offering service to customers. But, customers have also stopped asking for service. What large numbers of them are actually looking for is a captive audience on whom they can unload a day or a lifetime of frustration that may or may not be related to the issue at hand. Customer service reps are looking for ways to cut corners, help meet their company’s budget constraints, and avoid losing their jobs because they’ll be fired if they can’t meet their numbers. So, customers, when you call for service, remember that you’re dealing with a human being on the other end of the phone. Reps, remember that you also have a human being on the phone. Listen to what your customer is saying, and be willing to occasionally step around the “rules” to resolve his situation. Customers, keep in mind that sometimes sidestepping the rules means your issue won’t be resolved instantaneously. Be patient, and give the rep a little extra time to satisfy your request. This will result in a customer service experience that’s exceptional for both of you. Hopefully, this has shed some light for both sides about why the quality of customer service is in decline. A pleasant and satisfying customer service experience is rare in 2011. I think that’s the rub. Courteous, generous service used to be the rule in society (not just in business). Sadly, it has become the exception.