EMBRACE CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS

Businesses spend a lot of money, resources, and efforts?trying to find out ways to meet the needs and expectations of customers to ensure their satisfaction. However, sometimes despite all the efforts made they fail to please customers.

Unfortunately, many businesses brush off customer complaints. They are not aware that complaints are good opportunities ?to improve their products, services, and customer experience if they are handled effectively.

So, instead of neglecting and ignoring them, businesses should encourage customers to complain and define ways to provide feedback.

Complaints management is an essential component of businesses success. It helps them to reduced costs, increased profitability and increased customer satisfaction.

What Businesses can learn from customer complaints?

The main lessons that Businesses can learn from customer complaints are:

·???????Which products or services need to be improved;

·???????What systems, services, or processes aren't working as intended.

·???????What competitors are doing that business could learn from.

How to handle customer complaints?

Dealing with customer complaints in a constructive manner helps to keep customers and maintain their loyalty. To handle customer complaints effectively, the procedure should include the following steps:

1-??Listen and understand:

Give your customer the opportunity to express all of his complaint. Even if you disagree, do not cut him. After you have listened to your customer’s complaint, it is your turn to start asking questions for clarification.

Reiterate its problem to demonstrate that you were listening.

2- Thank the customer& Apologize:

Thank the customer for bringing the matter to your attention. Then, apologize and accept ownership.

3-??Offer solution to fix the problem:

?Ask your customer what response they are seeking: It could be a repair, replacement or refund. ?

4-??Record details of the complaint:

Keep records of all complaints. This will help businesses ?to identify any trends or matters.

5-??Investigate ?& Resolve the complaint:

The complaint is investigated, in order to determine the validity of the complaint and where possible, the cause.

The results of the investigation should be recorded. Where possible, the investigation should determine the reasons for the complaint and action to be taken for immediate correction and action to prevent recurrences (find the root cause and solve it). ??

The customer must be advised of the results of the investigation and any proposed action to prevent recurrences.Keep the customer informed if there are any delays in resolving their request.

?6-??Follow up:?

Contact the customer to find out if they were satisfied with how its complaint was handled.?Make sure your staff are trained to follow your procedure when handling complaints.?

7- Customer Complaints Trends Analysis.

Businesses should compare customer complaint data over time to identify any consistent results or trends. Customer complaints trends analysis can give businesses insights into changes required to remain on track.

Customer complaints are good for businesses.

Managing customer complaints is the best way to collect feedback from your customer and improve your products & services.?