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Amaris
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Wow. That is wholly inexcusable on her part. If that is her behavior toward customers and fellow employees, she's earned a firing.
Customer Service Quality
- Thread starter Gryffindorian
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Wow. That is wholly inexcusable on her part. If that is her behavior toward customers and fellow employees, she's earned a firing.
Jesus. Were she my employee she'd either find herself on nights for a while or more likely looking for a new job.
I like pointing out bad service to management. Last night I went to a local box store to buy a new tv. I was shopping, and looking for a salesperson for about 5 min. No one was around. As I was leaving, I walked by two salespeople off in a corner chatting with each other.
I went to the front desk and asked, "Do you sell tv's?"
The customer service person answered, "Yes, in our Entertainment section."
"Well, you might want to tell the people who work in that area. You just lost a sale."
Hit them in the pocket enough, they might get the hint. If not, no loss IMHO.
I went to the front desk and asked, "Do you sell tv's?"
The customer service person answered, "Yes, in our Entertainment section."
"Well, you might want to tell the people who work in that area. You just lost a sale."
Hit them in the pocket enough, they might get the hint. If not, no loss IMHO.
Why would you even give someone like that another chance? That sort of behavior is utterly uncalled for in any customer service situation. And hell, not only was she lousy to customers, she was nasty to her own coworkers. Somebody like that deserves to be fired on the spot.
^ Right. Bad day or not, that lady deserves to get the ax.
That was a great story. It beautifully and charmingly illustrated the point I was trying to make. Thank you for sharing it! It demonstrates exactly what good salesmanship is about, and should be a lesson to others.
I think that a good salesperson is a good student of human nature, and in fact, some of the finest such students there are. Whenever I have the opportunity to teach med students or junior psychiatrists I always tell them that if they want a masterclass in what transference/counter-transference mean in practice (and how to use them constructively in understanding/managing an interaction) they will learn more from watching a good salesman do his job than from watching an average health professional.
But I'm less likely to buy if a feel a salesman is trying to get me to buy something. I might be interested in buying a new TV/Car etc.. but when I'm ready I'll come and find you.
By all means ask if I need assitance, but If I say no please refrain from trying to sell something. Until I'm ready
But this might be down to cultural differences. Just because one appraoch works in one country doesn't mean it'll work the same in another.
By all means ask if I need assitance, but If I say no please refrain from trying to sell something. Until I'm ready
But this might be down to cultural differences. Just because one appraoch works in one country doesn't mean it'll work the same in another.
"The customer is always right" should be replaced with, "The customer is usually an asshole (or an idiot.)" Some people simply are not worth the time or angst that goes along with taking their money.
doubleohfive
Fleet Admiral
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4bLSXEfJuw[/yt]
"The customer is NOT always right! The customer is usually a moron and an asshole!"
Great minds think alike? Or idiots think in stereo?
You decide.
doubleohfive
Fleet Admiral
Huh. Vanilla.
How is the vanilla?
How is the vanilla?
Being a good salesperson includes judging when & how to approach customers in any culture; when to engage & when to back off. Sometimes a person who initially declines help can easily be engaged without it seeming pressured. Sometimes not. It takes a very high level of skill to be able to intuit the correct approach to take for an individual, often on the basis of very limited overt information.
This is why in lower-end sales venues (with lower-end calibre staff), training resorts to either scripted approaches or high pressure approaches. You will lose a lot of potential sales with both methods, but given the poor quality of salesperson you're trying to train, it could be the least-worst way to train them, especially if you're in a fly-by-night industry where repeat business & complaints are irrelevant.
But deciding whether a prospective sale falls into this category or not is a crucial skill that many salespeople lack.
Good salespeople can gauge this more accurately than bad ones. Take Alrik's story: to him, just starting out on the job, the woman came off as a difficult customer, and there are plenty of difficult customers who it IS worth engaging & taking money from. It was the experience (and probably innate natural talent) of Alrik's dad that allowed him to make the value judgement about whether pursuing a sale would be worth it. The more independence & seniority a salesperson has, the easier they will find it to say no.
Lots of bad salespeople blame customers; it isn't a question of a bad customer. There's no such thing IMO. It's a question of identifying the correct path to direct the customer, which may sometimes be politely declining their custom as there's no way of them fitting your business model. Similarly bad customer service is frequently a matter of people poorly suited to the role they find themselves in. Think of all the disinterested spotty post-pubescents you see in electronics stores. Most of them aren't bad people, but most of them are really bad salespeople. They're in the wrong role for their skillset.
The worst interactions occur when an ill-suited customer meets a poor salesman; complaints through the roof, on both sides!
Communication & interpersonal skills are still massively underrated by many employers, even in this day & age. People working with the public need at least a basic psychological understanding how other people function, and without that, problems & complaints are sadly inevitable.
If you ever quit posting suddenly, I guess we'll know it was for murdering a gas station attendant.
Tipping isn't dead, your business associates are assholes.
It wouldn't be a matter of "giving her another chance" but a matter of "I need x-much staff to properly run things." If I can't fire her because it'd leave me short-handed then I'll just give her a shitty schedule and if she's part-time probably give her as few hours as possible. She'd certainly find herself on the "short list" and another complaint would certainly mean the ax (regardless of the help) but I have to look at the bigger picture.
The way they have things now even I have to watch my hours and can't have overtime, so if cutting her off my schedule leaves me short-handed then that's not doing anyone any real favors. Unless I could secure help to come in to replace her she likely wouldn't be fired right away. But, hell, there's no statute of limitations on when bad behavior can lead to a termination and Kansas is an At-Will State so I can can her anytime I want for virtually any reason I choose.
Give her a shitty schedule, secure replacement help, fire her.
Being a good salesperson includes judging when & how to approach customers in any culture; when to engage & when to back off. Sometimes a person who initially declines help can easily be engaged without it seeming pressured. Sometimes not. It takes a very high level of skill to be able to intuit the correct approach to take for an individual, often on the basis of very limited overt information.
This is why in lower-end sales venues (with lower-end calibre staff), training resorts to either scripted approaches or high pressure approaches. You will lose a lot of potential sales with both methods, but given the poor quality of salesperson you're trying to train, it could be the least-worst way to train them, especially if you're in a fly-by-night industry where repeat business & complaints are irrelevant.
But deciding whether a prospective sale falls into this category or not is a crucial skill that many salespeople lack.
Good salespeople can gauge this more accurately than bad ones. Take Alrik's story: to him, just starting out on the job, the woman came off as a difficult customer, and there are plenty of difficult customers who it IS worth engaging & taking money from. It was the experience (and probably innate natural talent) of Alrik's dad that allowed him to make the value judgement about whether pursuing a sale would be worth it. The more independence & seniority a salesperson has, the easier they will find it to say no.
Lots of bad salespeople blame customers; it isn't a question of a bad customer. There's no such thing IMO. It's a question of identifying the correct path to direct the customer, which may sometimes be politely declining their custom as there's no way of them fitting your business model. Similarly bad customer service is frequently a matter of people poorly suited to the role they find themselves in. Think of all the disinterested spotty post-pubescents you see in electronics stores. Most of them aren't bad people, but most of them are really bad salespeople. They're in the wrong role for their skillset.
The worst interactions occur when an ill-suited customer meets a poor salesman; complaints through the roof, on both sides!
Communication & interpersonal skills are still massively underrated by many employers, even in this day & age. People working with the public need at least a basic psychological understanding how other people function, and without that, problems & complaints are sadly inevitable.
I whole-heartedly agree.
One other type of customer service that people tend to complain about is that of the government or public sector. An example would be the DMV office or the Postal Service, where the reps don't put so much emphasis on fast, friendly, or efficient service. Since employees hold civil-service positions and are often labor union-represented, they know they can pretty much get away with anything as long as they do their jobs, no matter how poorly they perform. It's gotten better in the last decade or so.
I think in the industry I'm in (public utilities sector), customer service has gotten so much better over the years. There are key performance indicators and standards that management puts in place to enhance not only productivity but also quality service. I know this from the people who work at our call center and respond to various customer inquiries (account and billing questions, water service interruptions, etc.). The CSRs have rather rigid work schedules. They are always expected to be on time. They're required to be on the phone and meet their quota of handling calls for the duration of their shift, with very limited breaks in between. I hear it's not always easy to schedule some time off from work, and attendance is monitored carefully.
It's a very constrained work environment, which is not something I could get used to. I prefer a little flexibility and breathing room. For that matter, I don't work in customer service.
It really takes a certain personality ... The bottom line is that any person can work any job, but he wouldn't be necessarily very good at it.Whilst I'm not in sales I am in retail. So yes I have to deal with customer complaints that the Customer Assitants/ Supervisors are unable to resolve, If I as the deputy can't resolve the complanint to the customers satisfication they can speak to the manger ( if they are in). Though usually a quick and painless refund and an aopology does the trick.
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