How to Be Customer Unfriendly
One
of my favorite airlines committed a customer interface
blunder. They changed the automated telephone menu system
for reservations, removed the 24-hour fast-access option
for frequent flyers, set up the menu so it changes at
various times of the day, and put long recorded messages
on the system to ‘educate’ passengers while
they wait.
I’ve called this airline many times. My fingers
know which buttons to push to get what I need without
delay. Now my fingers are lost and my ears are listening
to long messages. I am still trying to figure out which
menu works at which time of day and which buttons I
need to push.
A similar experience took place when WordPerfect introduced
‘WordPerfect for Windows’ and all
the function keys were changed. Long ago, WordPerfect
was the word-processing program of choice.
But overnight my loyalty to WordPerfect evaporated.
As long as I had to re-learn a whole new set of keystrokes,
I might as well learn Microsoft Word. And what happened
to WordPerfect? Massive decline in market share. (We
all know what’s happening with Microsoft Word,
now dominating the word processing arena.)
Key Learning Point
Revolutionary
transformation can have great power - but evolutionary
change may keep your customers happier and profitably
on board.
Action Steps
When you want to
make a change or an `upgrade' to your systems, keep your
customer's experience foremost in your mind. Once your
customers learn to love you, do all you can to keep them.
Don't throw that love away!
Next Article in Customer Service Contact >>
Three Steps to Welcome
First Article in Customer Service Culture >>
Top Ten Tips To Build a Superior Service Culture
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Ron Kaufman is an internationally acclaimed customer service training educator for quality service.
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