Customer Service

In the past 6 months or so, I have received possibly some of the worst customer service experiences that I have ever had. 

These people weren't outwardly rude in their conversation but the general attitude of these experiences were just lackluster. It was very much like the employees providing the customer 'service' just did not give two hoots about me, my custom or their representation of the place they were supposed to be representing. 

Conversationless transactions are, in my opinion, more infuriating and disappointing than if someone was just outright rude to my face. But the more and more experiences I am having with a face to face representatives, the more it appears to be happening. 

I was served by a manager of a high street clothing store recently, I was with my niece, we'd been on a shopping trip for her birthday present and I'd spent a considerable amount of money in the store. When we both arrived at the cash desk, I was faced by a manager who was more interested in gossiping with her colleagues about another colleague than actually acknowledging myself or my niece for the first few minutes of us being there. When the manager did finally pull herself away from the conversation, she barely looked in our direction, didn't inform me of how much my purchases came to, didn't ask if there was anything else I needed, actually, she didn't speak to us at all. Purchases were shoved in a bag and we were on our way.

I was very disappointed with the customer service that we'd experienced, it is beyond me how a manager thinks it's perfectly OK to not even acknowledge the presence of customers, who are spending money in their store and furthermore to then let them leave their store feeling disappointed with their experience.

In a time where online shopping is becoming increasingly popular, stores of all sizes need to be focusing on giving customer service and making people want to go back in to their stores to receive outstanding customer service repeatedly. Customer service is an art, I'm not going to sit here on my high horse and pretend that customer service roles are easy, because they just aren't; customers are sometimes just arses.

But you know what, customer representatives do need to care.

High streets are slowly disappearing and empty shop windows are becoming a regular occurrence, it would be sad to see it shrink further due to customer service. 
Training, praise and example from above is key.

Just a quick side note; I have worked in customer service roles, albeit not retail and am still currently in one. I wouldn't write this post if I had never walked a few hundred miles in the CS shoes. 

Toodles.

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