Customer servile

As my last post earlier this week provoked a repsonse, I thought I would return to it. Clearly my suggestion that the American way of service is to be aspired to was too much for Kevin who,

"couldn't think of anything worse than an american telling me the value of service"

Interestingly, Lucy Kellaway whose article originally prompted my thoughts had a follow up in which she experienced some great service (The pen is mightier than high-tech gadgets). So as Zine and Zein highlighted in their comments, I was generalising and my suggested course would probably not sell to them.

I had the additional thought that the internet might be responsbile for an overall decline in customer service, in the same way that text messaging has destroyed conversation. In that it has moved human beings further apart and therefore further away from an immediate reaction to what thay say or think. Being face to face with someone tends to temper most extremes of communication (think about how often you shout expletives after you have hung up the phone or walked out the door).

But then I immediately challenge myself that this could just be further evidence of myself getting older and heading towards the inevitable day when I moan in exasperation about, "The youth of today!!" (Incidentally you can shoot me when I start doing this). The Internet is not bad in and of itself. The point is what is facilitates (see Michael Wesch's original film "The Machine is Us" for more on this) and it should facilitate even better service.

Maybe it is the fact that 25% of us are unhappy in our jobs and a third of us do not feel engaged. The people from whom I have had the best customer service are the people who seem to care or show an interest, whether in the UK, the USA or elsewhere. Those who feel they are wage slaves are unlikely ever to serve the customer genuinely.

As to whether this is the responsibility of the employee to move to a job that they enjoy and fell valued in or the employer to make the employee feel valued and content, I fear the debate will never end.

Is it really that difficult to smile?

I have been thinking about Lucy Kellaway's article last Monday, "Turning customer delight into disgust" and I have finally conceded to my wife that the British just don't know how to do customer service. My wife, a Serb who has lived in Russia and America and thus experienced the extremes of the customer experience, has long been baffled about how badly we, the British, treat our clients.

I have generally curled my toes in embarrassment and tried to shuffle away from my wife as she berates the latest unfortunate for failing to provide even an adequate response (I don't think what we receive on the whole in this country even qualifies as "a service"). But the point is I am at fault not her. I think the root of it may be generational and lurks within the phrase, "Mustn't grumble".

This spirit was admirable when the Blitz was on and was indeed admired throughout the world as being evidence of our tenacity and spirit. It seems however to have evolved into never complaining to the people at fault and developing a sarcastic streak a mile wide to moan about our unfortunate lives with our friends. It is perhaps why comedy flourishes in the UK. We are not prepared to get off our behinds and confront poor service we would rather create jokes about it.

Lucy's experience at the hands of a low cost airline I have had with other low costs airlines and with flag carriers. I cant remember the last time I had a retail experience that could be classed as enjoyable - indeed my wife and I stormed out of a major electrical supplier at the weekend after wasting half and hour on the completely unreasonable expectation that there would be someone employed there who knew something about anything... I have had to threaten legal action against the company that sold me my scooter before I got what could be called service. And hotels and restaurants leave me cold. I went to a pizza restaurant in Balham with my family and next door neighbours on Saturday and there was a nail in one of the pizzas.

Had the nail been in my pizza or that of my wife or daughter we would have addressed it. However, it was in my my neighbours' elder daughter's pizza and they would not make a fuss. In fact she apologised to the waiter, after I had drawn attention to it and the waiter was already grovelling. My neighbour paid the bill, possibly to stop me from extracting a significant discount and causing further embarrassment.

Now I don't say this to ridicule my neighbour or their daughters, they are amongst the nicest people in the world. But this behaviour in the face of dreadful service goes to show that in the end we get the customer service we deserve.

I have been thinking of developing a training course, "Customer service: the American way" for some time but have held back for fear of offending people and it not selling. But now I think maybe that was just another way of avoiding embarrassment. What do you think?

As a service lead economy should we sort out our act to have a future or am I becoming just another grumpy old man?