When
you make a call to a company for
service, either you interact with
people or interact with machines.
In case of people, often bells keep
ringing or somebody attends and
drops the call without any answer.
It is your good luck if someone
picks up at three bells and responds
you without any hold. If you get
quick service, you can easily guess
that it may be either a reputable
company which has invested lot of
time and money in training its people.
Incase of interaction with computers,
you keep responding to various questions
through buttons and finally after
answering lot of questions, you
are able to get service and sometimes
even no response from the machine.
To create a great customer service
attitude in an organization, the
best way is continuous training.
It is the only way that we can
develop service orientation, attitude
and good quality customer service
culture. So the right strategy
is to train, train and train.
Before training of the people,
we need to understand first the
Customer Service system which
will set service orientation standards
on the basis of which service
attitude will be measured and
improved. We should also formulate
the objectives of the customer
service system, which customer
service people and system should
achieve. The objectives of Customer
Service system can be:
To acquire new customers
To retain old customers
To provide superior service to customers
To build customer loyalty
The
Customer Service system ultimately
is derived from the users/customer's
demands because all of us are users
in one way or the other. Users'
expectations can be characterized
as:
Reliable and fast service.
Friendly service contact
Matching quality and price
Complete response for all service
requests
Timely and honest response
Fulfilled commitments
Accurate information
Less human errors
No or minimum hold for long time.
The good customer service system
is the one which fulfils the entire
needs of the users from pre-sales
contact to post-sales interactions.
Users' demands can be fulfilled
easily if the Customer Service system
is effective, efficient and adaptable.
The good Customer Service system
should at least consist of three
important elements:
Customer
Service people
Customer Service technologies
Customer Service infrastructure
Customer Service People
(CSP)
Customer Service
people are the most important part
of Customer Service system. These
act as the interface between the
company and customers. Customer
Service people should be friendly,
experienced, trained and motivated
individuals delivering services
to customers to meet their perceived
expectations. There is a greater
need to train the Customer Service
Representatives (CSRs) to meet the
user demands. CSRs are the ambassadors
of the companies and there is a
strong need to invest time and money
to train them so that they can satisfy
customers' expectations. The most
important value differentiator is
today's competitive world is “Service
value” which calls for continuous
improvement and continuous training
can create this value. This is the
ultimate value for which the customer
pays. This is the integrated value
satisfying customer starting from
pre-sale contact to post sales contact.
Customer
Service Technologies (CST)
The ultimate aim
of deploying technologies is to
deliver the ultimate value to customers.
The Customer Service technologies
should be capable of acquiring new
customers and should assist and
guide customer service persons in
solving complaints and queries.
The CCT should include sufficient
automation to provide prompt service
to customers, the system should
be designed in such a way that the
interaction with the customer is
of high quality (i.e. there should
be minimum waiting and holding time).
The technology should be easy to
use, incorporate procedures, reduce
information being typed and verify
entered information. This technology
should be capable of providing high
processing power to Customer Service
people helping them to be efficient
and satisfactory for customers.
The integration of computers, servers,
telecommunication systems/equipment
and application software integrated
with Customer Service applications
will improve coordination and reduce
human errors and will also improve
inter-operability between various
technologies and will eliminate
manual coordination among different
technologies. The technology should
provide GUIs (Graphical User Interface)
and should be more intuitive and
therefore easier to learn. The technology
should also be able to provide selected
information to other service providers.
The technology must meet the following
functional requirements of the Customer
Service system:
New service: The
technology should answer the new
service requests. The technology
should guide the customer service
person step by step for service
information.
Bill
adjustment: The technology
should help the customer service
person in the easy access to billing
information, allowing adjustments
on valid items and for valid reasons
and by checking the adjustment against
customer service person's adjustment
limit. The technology should capture
these events automatically and submit
adjustment requests to the billing
system.
Modification of service:
When a user requests that
a service be modified, the customer
service person must know about the
service behind modified, enter the
modification, let the user know
the pricing change(if any) and submit
the order.
Discontinuation
of service: When a user
requests that service be disabled,
the technology should provide procedure
to disconnect the service and produce
outstanding amount against him/her.
Monitor
customer accounts: The
technology should provide complete
monitoring and control of customers'
accounts as per their needs.
Customer
Service Infrastructure (CSI)
The third important
pillar of the Customer Service system
is the infrastructure which includes
Customer Service centers build up,
Customer Service system and procedures,
communication and computers equipment,
networking and communication, cabling,
fixtures, furniture, office layouts
and system of interconnection of
all different technologies and systems.
The good infrastructure results
in good customer service that is
free from defects and human errors.
The trend in Pakistan
is to make beautiful and lucrative
Customer Service centers to attract
the customers but real value delivery
depends upon how smartly the three
components of Customer Service are
integrated and real Customer Service
value is generated. Today's business
success depends upon the customer
service value generated by the Customer
Service system employed in the service
industry.
The writer
has done B.Sc Engineering from UET
in electronics and Communication
and has done MBA from IBA - Punjab
University Lahore. He has 24 years
of experience in maintenance, marketing,
management of technology products
and services in various companies.
Currently he is working as country
manager sales, marketing and business
development in COMSATS Internet
Services Islamabad. He can be reached
at fbhutta@comsats.net.pk.
