A few years ago, my husband bought a car battery from O’Reilly’s Auto Store which included a warranty. This weekend, the battery died and he took it to the O’Reilly’s location where he made his purchase. The manager of this location looked at my husband with suspicion and questioned (in a decidedly non-customer friendly manner) what the problem was. After my husband explained, the manager looked at it and said that it was purchased in 2005 so he couldn’t help him out. As the manager walked away, Hubbie said it was under a 72 month warranty. The manager said “Exactly, that’s why I can’t replace it.” Hubbie pointed out that even if he had bought it in 2005, with a 72 month warranty, it was still covered. Irritated, the manager said that he would have to test the battery himself and that it would take at least an hour. He told my husband to wait – which he did not.
Now Hubbie has been in customer-related industries his whole working career. Despite being treated nefariously, he believes in second chances. So rather than call the corporate headquarters, he called the manager’s boss, the area manager (AM). He told the AM that he needed to share the experience he had at the _____ location. Immediately defensive, the AM asked what happened. Hubbie explained what happened, how he was treated and that it was the worst experience he’d ever had at any O’Reilly’s. The AM continued to be defensive. Hubbie also told the AM about all the times he’s received great service from other stores and mentioned one of the good managers by name. (BTW, the good manager’s name is Randy and he is at the Bandera & Mainland location in San Antonio. He’s great.) The AM dismissively told my husband “I’ll take care of it.” Sensing that the AM did not seem interested, Hubbie told the AM that when they finished their conversation, he would be contacting the corporate office. At that point, the AM’s tone changed. “Let me fix this for you. What can I do to make this right? I tell you what. I will meet you at the store tomorrow so I can handle this personally for you.”
I’m sure this type of situation has happened to you too. You take the time to present a company with a problem and instead you’re made out to be the bad guy.
Complaints are never easy to hear, especially when we pour our blood, sweat and tears into our businesses. But here’s the thing – the AM should have been grateful that my husband took the time to call him. And as business owners, we should welcome complaints! Why?
Because the customer that complains to you is giving you an opportunity to fix it. And it’s your response to the complaint that will determine whether he sings your praises or tells all his friends what crappy treatment he got.
Let’s look to Christus Health as an example of what to do. Colleen Pence, founder and president of Social Media Mentoring gave kudos to Christus on Facebook for how they handled a complaint on their Facebook fan page. When I saw her post, I had to see what happened. Here is a snapshot of the Facebook post, which you can also access here.
Can we learn to reframe how we respond to complaints?
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And … you never know who’s going to blog about their bad (or good) experience about their complaint and how it’s handled. Handling complaints well is just good business.
Yes, these days we never know who has a blog. I was asked yesterday why I published the name of the company. If the Area Manager had followed through on his commitment to personally handle the situation, the store would have remained anonymous. Thank you for your comment and welcome to the Sanera blog family Elmer!
Good customer service training teaches just that, a complaint is a gift. I personally teach “customer service is everyone’s business”. That includes internal customer service, and if more companies adopted the philosophy we would have less employee dissatisfaction! That in turn has the added benefit of happier customers too =)
Karla, you’ve pointed out what most companies fail to realize. It begins with hiring the right people for the right jobs, creating an internal culture of value and respect for the employees which (hopefully) turns into value and respect for customers which leads to increased sales and then increased profitability. The debate is around which of these points is most important for companies to devote their resources. Thanks for your comment and welcome to the Sanera blog family!
One of the true differentiators in the 21st century is crazy great customer service — inside and out. Good isn’t good enough and sadly many businesses aren’t even making the good grade anymore.