STORYTELLING

There was an article in People Management, the CIPD journal, last November about storytelling and the use of stories, or parables as I called them in a recent post, in training. One story concerned a large hotel. A man and a young boy were spending a few days there and the staff had, rightly, surmised that they were father and son.

One evening the man returned to reception after taking his son to his room and told his story. It seemed that the boy was seriously ill and was about to begin a course of chemotherapy. What concerned him most was the fact that he was about to lose his hair. To pre-empt that, he had decided to shave his head that night and his father was going to do the same as a mark of support. The father wanted to ask the staff not to react when he and his son came down for breakfast the next day.

When the man and boy arrived for breakfast the next morning, they were astonished to find that ten of the male staff had also shaved their heads and were going about their duties with shiny pates. That is customer service!

CUSTOMER SERVICE 3

When will companies learn that good customer service keeps customers and attracts new business, while poor service simply plays into the hands (and bank accounts) of their rivals? I have been a customer of the same Internet company for more than 10 years. I have been paying much more than I needed to but did not think of it because I received the service I expected and had no thought of moving. At the beginning of December I was accessing my e-mails remotely and met with an error message advising me that there was a problem with the website's security certificate. That worried me and I wrote to them to let them know and at the same time I asked them a question about my connection speed. There was no reply so I wrote again a week later. Still no reply.

10 days later when there was still no reply I discussed the situation with David Simpson of Megalomedia who designed and looks after the hosting of my website. David said that he could provide the e-mail service I needed for a tenth, yes 10%, of what I was paying. I wrote to the company to tell them that I was cancelling my contract. Within three working days I had a reply to my initial query and later that day a reply to my cancellation message. The second reply asked me to call a 10pence per minute number to discuss this with them and advised me that I could not cancel the contract by e-mail. A contract with an e-mail services company!

I called the number. The woman I spoke to told me that she could not deal with a contract cancellation and that I had to call another number. I read her the e-mail from the "Customer Care Email Team" quoting the number which I had just called. She repeated that I should call another number. I did not. I have written and have also cancelled my direct debit.

Compare my daughter's experience. She has her home, etc. insurance with Endsleigh. She received a letter from a company offering services and realised that it was linked to Endsleigh. She called them. The man she spoke to said that he did not quite understand what had happened, it was not really his area but he would call her back within 10 minutes. 5 minutes later he called back with a full (and satisfactory) answer. My daughter and her husband had been considering moving their insurance business but this example of good customer service reminded them of why they give their business, and will continue to do so, to Endsleigh. It's easy isn't it?