32 Qualityworld

keepcomplaining

part 1 of 2

Over the past 20 years TTeedd MMaarrrraa has worked

with hundreds of organisations tackling com-

plaints management - a subject which is

now firmly on the quality agenda.

With pressure from ISO,

EFQM and other regula-

tors, the interest level

appears to be sustain-

able. In the first of

two articles he

outlines a first

class approach

to managing

complaints

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33Qualityworld

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practice complaints process beginningwith this ‘customer initiation’ step.

Ask yourself some key questions

So why is the term ‘best practice’ usedhere? Because it reflects a thorough under-standing of ISO and excellence model/Malcolm Baldrige requirements. Thisprocess has been benchmarked against thebest and has stood the test of time. In anutshell, how would you answer thesequestions - related to the process in figure1 - for your organisation?• how well does the customer know

where or how to complain? (contactprocess)

• how effective are your staff in resolv-ing the complaint? (fulfilment process)

• how do you know if you have pre-served the customer’s loyalty eventhough they have made a complaint?(validation process)

• do you have a rapid method for detect-ing and acting on time-sensitive orissues of particular severity/risk? (esca-lation process)

• how do you maintain the effectivenessof the complaint process and utiliseinformation from it to drive improve-ment?

The contact processJust how well do your customers knowwho to complain to or where to complain?Do you know? The harsh reality is thatmost organisations do a notoriously poor

job of educating their customers on thistopic. So what are the critical componentsthat need to take place at this step? Figure2 outlines the key points to consider.

Presuming the customer has been properlyeducated (and by the way, it usually turnsout that if you give the customer the rulesof the game, they will abide by them), justhow accessible are you? • how easy do you make it for customers

to reach someone who can help them?• are they immediately faced with a

menu of choices that never ends?• are they placed in queue for 20 min-

utes listening to boring messages ormusic which is too loud or obnoxious?

• just how many barriers do you createfor customers during this upfront con-tact process?

The reality of it is that customers general-ly have two key expectations when theycontact an organisation to complain. Thefirst of these is ‘can I get through?’ and thesecond is ‘when I get through, will the per-son be able to help me?’. If you fail oneither of these, the customer will be evenless satisfied than they were before theytried to contact you.

Clearly, this example relates to telephoneinteraction, but still represents the mostpopular contact type for most organisa-tions. However, making the leap to lettersor email is not that difficult. Instead of anideally free phone number, is there a freep-

Closed loop

Management process

Escalation

process

Contact processCustomer initiation Fulfilment process Validation process

Figure 1. A best practice complaints process

Frankly, there have been quiteenough articles singing the prais-es of complaints as a goldenopportunity or a treasure chest ofimprovement. To put it crudely,

any executive or quality manager who has-n’t got this message is quite possibly men-tally challenged.

Research over the past few years in partic-ular has continued to show that customersare becoming more demanding, less toler-ant of failure and more willing to defect tocompetitors. Dealing successfully with cus-tomer enquiries, problems and complaintscan not only preserve the relationship in adifficult or problematic situation, but actu-ally strengthen it.

It’s not rocket science

The future success of most organisationsdirectly links to customer relationships.That said, many companies are still strug-gling to come to terms with how to buildand maintain excellent customer relation-ships, and how effective recovery fromproblems and complaints can better pre-serve the relationship. From an economicstandpoint this makes sense considering itcosts six to 20 times more to get a newcustomer than to keep an existing one.

Moreover, a key factor which only a feworganisations now seem to be grasping isthat when a customer comes to do businesswith an organisation, they incur two costs.The first is simply the economic cost asso-ciated with the purchase of the goods orservices involved.

The other cost, however, is the emotionalcost - the time and level of effort the cus-tomer experiences with not only the pur-chase, but use of the products and services(especially if a problem is encountered). Inthe end, the economic cost may beextremely competitive, but if the emotion-al cost gets too high, the customer mayseek alternatives.

The first fact that must be acknowledged isthat complaints management is largely areactive process, as it is the customer whotakes the initiative to complain in mostcases. Figure 1 depicts the steps in a best

34 Qualityworld

ost address, for example? Is there an emailaddress that has been made readily avail-able to customers for their use when theyhave a complaint? Is the letter or emailanswered in a timely manner? How do yourecognise a complaint? There are codes tolook for in terms of the customer’s tone,use of language or implied level of emo-tion in the letter or email.

The last step is simply whether the cus-tomer is able to reach someone in yourorganisation who can quickly qualify theissue the customer is calling about. Inother words, is it a complaint or something

else (eg concern, question, compliment,request)? This is highly dependent uponwhether there is a clear, unambiguous def-inition of a complaint and whether theagents are trained effectively. Believe it ornot, there are organisations out therewhich say they have a complaints process,yet have no definition of a complaint.

By the end of this stage in the overall com-plaints process, it may well be that anacknowledgement has been sent to thecustomer if they had contacted you by let-ter or email. It may also be that an ‘owner’has been assigned according to the nature

of the issue involved. The bottom-line hereis what are you doing to mitigate the bar-riers to complaining? So here are the key,yet basic, management questions youmight want to consider addressing:• do you have a process map which

clearly describes the steps in your com-plaints management process? Theintent here is to raise the issue: ‘Do youconsider complaints management as alegitimate business process or just a setof procedures or activities?’

• how well do you educate your cus-tomers on how or where to complain?

• how do you ensure easy access to yourorganisation and its staff for customersto complain?

• do you have a clear, unambiguous def-inition of a complaint which is consis-tently followed by all staff ?

• how effectively and quickly can staffdiscern complaints from other sourcesof customer feedback?

Fulfilment and escalationIt is during this part of the overall com-plaints management process that the cus-tomer relationship is either preserved ordamaged beyond repair. Just how good areyour staff ? How have you invested in themwith regards to training and informationsystems? How capable have you madethem? Figure 3 outlines the elements ofthe fulfilment process.

During the fulfilment process, the twomain objectives are to: • effectively manage the interaction with

the customer to ensure the relationshipwill ultimately be preserved

• gather all appropriate information toenable an action plan to be developedwhich satisfies the customer and facili-tates process, product or serviceimprovement

As most of us know all too well, when thecustomer complains they are often in aheightened emotional state. Before anymeaningful dialogue can occur, the cus-tomer must be allowed to vent their frus-trations. It is here where your workforceneeds to be fully capable in how to defuseanger and avoid taking what the customersays personally. This is not always easy, assome customers can be abusive. However,

Awareness

• do I know who to call (name of individual)?

• do I know where to call?

• do I have a current number to call? If so,

where can I find it?

• is it a free-phone number?

• can I get through when I call?

• am I placed on hold for a long time?

• is the phone answered in a timely manner?

• is the person who answers willing and

able to help me?

• do I have to be transferred to someone

else? If so, who is it?

• is this a complaint?

Accessibility

Availability and qualification

Contact process

Information capture

Issue assessment

• input appropriate codes for data cap-

ture, analysis and reporting

• record salient verbatim comments

• apply anger-reduction techniques

• apply four step process:

Understand the issue(s)

Assess the severity (escalation?)

Negotiate a solution

Follow-through on commitment

Action planning

Follow-through(execution)

Fulfilment process

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Figure 2. The contact process

Figure 3. The fulfilment process

Crit

ical

com

pone

nts

action is taken to see it through. In manycases, action requires effective communica-tion, coordination or even collaborationwith other parts of the organisation.Sometimes organisations become paral-ysed and no action occurs because of inter-nal battles over ‘who’s going to pay’.

The unfortunate aspect here is that the cus-tomer is compromised while internaldepartments, functions or divisions battleit out and point fingers at one another. Agood rule to follow is fix the customerfirst, then worry about who’s going to pay!

In addition, organisations need to bear inmind that the longer it takes to resolve acomplaint, the less satisfied the customerwill be. Every customer has an expectationregarding how long it should take toresolve an issue. Customers are not daft: ifit is a complex issue, they are usually morethan willing to give you more time to getit right. If it’s a straightforward issue, theywill expect fast resolutions, unless you areable to communicate with them and tellthem why this might not be possible.

There are plenty of - and these are mostlysimple - steps organisations can take tobetter deal with complaints. But what ifyou want to go that extra mile? Someorganisations want to differentiate theirperformance in this area. Establishing acoding system is one such way of edgingahead of the competition.

This more advanced approach to com-plaints management will be covered in thesecond part of this article next month

by reassuring the customer that they arethere to help, staff members will be acalming influence, rather than throwingmore petrol on the fire.

What’s the best system?

If the past 20 years has proved anything, itis simply that agents must follow some sortof systematic cycle of interaction with thecustomer once he or she is in a rationalstate and is willing to work with your peo-ple to get the issue addressed. This willdramatically increase the success ratio indealing with the customer’s complaint.The following steps should set your organ-isation on the right path to complaintsmanagement.

Understand the issueWhen the customer is upset, they canthrow everything but the kitchen sink atyou - recalling events that took place ayear ago or even three years ago. The roleof your staff is to sort through all this tounderstand what the issue is that needs tobe addressed today.

Assess the severityNot all problems or complaints carry thesame weight in the customer’s mind. I canguarantee that if the customer receives anincorrect invoice, 100 per cent of the timethey will call up and complain. However,it is equally true that if handled properly,the issue can be made to go away 100 percent of the time, as well as ensuring thatthe relationship is preserved. If this sameproblem occurs each month though, thenultimately the customer will disengage.

There are some issues which may not be soeasily resolved, such as account executivesnot returning a customer’s telephone calls.This will communicate to the customerthat they are not important or being takenfor granted. Depending on the severity(legal, liability, risk level), the issue mayneed to be escalated quickly to ensure that

it gets the right level of attention. Havingcriteria in place for when escalation willoccur is key, otherwise there may be a ten-dency to escalate unnecessarily or to thewrong level.

Negotiate a solutionA critical success factor in negotiating aneffective solution involves asking a simple,but key question of the customer: ‘Whatwould you like us to do?’ Unless this ques-tion is asked, your staff are placed in theposition of having to assume what thecustomer would like to see happen. Theymay guess correctly or they may not. Thebottom-line is that without knowingwhere the customer is coming from, it ishard to negotiate a mutually satisfactorysolution. Research and experience hasshown also that often the customer wantsfar less than you assume.

Follow through on commitmentsIt does little good to negotiate a successfulsolution to the customer’s complaint if no

Ted Marra is president of Marra Quality Inc, which

focuses on performance and relationship excel-

lence. He has been vice president at Walker: CSM,

president of consultancy, Care Associates and of

TARP Midwest. In these positions he concentrated

on the design, pilot testing and full implementation

of customer complaint management processes.

Next month: Advanced complaints management -

establishing a formal coding system.

35Qualityworld

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‘It does little good to negotiate a successful solution to the customer’s complaint ifno action is taken to see it through. Action requires effective communication,

coordination or even collaboration with other parts of the organisation.’

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