Complaint man­age­ment

Even in the best companies, not everything runs smoothly all the time: Ul­ti­mately, it is very difficult to an­ti­cip­ate the wishes and needs of every single customer. It could be that the great majority of the target group is in fact satisfied with your offering, yet some of them non­ethe­less have problems with your product or service. There are also times when something simply goes wrong during man­u­fac­tur­ing, pro­vi­sion­ing, or delivery. The product that the customer receives isn’t quite like it’s ad­vert­ised, or the service isn’t provided as you had planned. Mistakes can happen – yet the fact that paying customers are not happy with it is something that probably every business pro­fes­sion­al can un­der­stand.

This is why it is so important to establish a func­tion­ing complaint man­age­ment process. One that ensures a good rapport with the client even after a mistake has been made and that keeps them from turning away from your company in anger. Fur­ther­more, a well-organised complaint man­age­ment process reduces the risk of delivery or man­u­fac­tur­ing errors. This is because customer feedback only has to reach the right de­part­ment for the product to be made even better in the future.

Just about every company receives com­plaints from customers – no one is com­pletely immune to it. As a company gets larger, the number of critics usually grows as well. Even­tu­ally the number of com­plaints gets so big and the company structure so complex that one must introduce a complaint man­age­ment process.

This is because chaos rules without a well-thought-out system, and this can have a sig­ni­fic­ant impact on the success of your company. An un­sat­is­fied customer who doesn’t have their feedback taken into con­sid­er­a­tion will probably no longer trust your offering and will also tell others about how frus­trated they are. In the past, it was perhaps only a few friends and family members who were likely to be in­flu­enced by a negative report. However, in the internet era, com­plaints often reach countless readers.

Complaint man­age­ment is all about meth­od­ic­ally handling customer criticism. Strategies must be developed and it must be de­term­ined where com­plaints should be received, how one should react to feedback and which de­part­ments or in­di­vidu­als the criticism should be forwarded to. The al­loc­a­tion of re­spons­ib­il­it­ies also falls under complaint man­age­ment. Only once it’s clear who needs to react in each instance can an actual negative criticism be trans­formed into something positive.

The complete complaint man­age­ment process is conducive to achieving two goals:

• Customer sat­is­fac­tion: Complaint man­age­ment is supposed to reduce customer dis­sat­is­fac­tion and ideally even strengthen customer loyalty.
• Quality assurance: Through complaint man­age­ment, customer feedback reaches the right de­part­ments and con­trib­utes to the im­prove­ment of the product or service.

The goals mentioned above influence the tasks and as a result the complaint man­age­ment pro­ced­ures as well. In ac­cord­ance with the customer sat­is­fac­tion and quality assurance goals, the tasks can be grouped into two areas. In this way there are several tasks that above all con­trib­ute to a positive customer rapport.

• Simplify com­plaints: So that un­sat­is­fied customers turn to you first instead of venting their dis­sat­is­fac­tion on social networks, you should offer the op­por­tun­ity for feedback in the simplest way possible. Only when the customer’s justified criticism is first reported to you can you make use of the complaint in a positive way.
• Ensure that the initial contact is positive: The customer is supposed to feel that they are in good hands when they submit their complaint. To achieve this, specially trained personnel must accept the criticism and make the un­sat­is­fied customer feel that their opinion is important.
• Clearly design the process: It must be clear which feedback will be forwarded to which de­part­ments. This is why the task of complaint man­age­ment is to create struc­tures and clarify re­spons­ib­il­it­ies.
• Carry out direct actions: Many responses if anything concern long-term quality assurance. However, one should also initiate some actions im­me­di­ately and directly after contact with the customer. Whether a price discount or product exchange is ap­pro­pri­ate depends on the in­di­vidu­al case. However, what the different options are (if any) should already be de­term­ined be­fore­hand.

On the other hand, a submitted complaint should also have a long-term effect on the company’s processes, as it is only in this way that per­form­ance quality can be improved sus­tain­ably.

• Analyse feedback: Customer com­plaints don’t follow any stand­ard­ised form. For this reason, all input must be evaluated with respect to content and the customer’s intention. This is in order to be able to recognise patterns, set pri­or­it­ies and implement measures.
• Audit man­age­ment: Even complaint man­age­ment itself must be audited regularly so that no negative pro­ced­ures creep in. Fur­ther­more, audits can unveil potential ways for you to optimise processes.
• Issue reports: Reports based on audits provide decision-makers with important in­dic­at­ors. These can form the basis for ini­ti­at­ing changes.
• Use of collected in­form­a­tion: Con­clu­sions can often be drawn from the data collected by complaint man­age­ment. In­form­a­tion acquired by complaint man­age­ment often provides points of reference for quality assurance and can later con­trib­ute to im­prove­ments in pro­duc­tion and service per­form­ance.

So that complaint man­age­ment tasks can be suc­cess­fully mastered, certain framework con­di­tions must be satisfied. First of all, it requires an or­gan­isa­tion­al structure. This is why complaint man­age­ment must be a fixed component within the company and also re­cog­nised as an important factor by company ex­ec­ut­ives. In addition, it is worth cla­ri­fy­ing to what extent there are points of in­ter­sec­tion with other business divisions.

Then it is worth finding the right personnel and to train them as is ap­pro­pri­ate. This relates es­pe­cially to direct contact with the customer. Employees must be skilled in diplomacy and de-es­cal­a­tion, and also must be able to deal with stressful situ­ations, as not all customers are con­struct­ive in their criticism.

Finally, a func­tion­ing in­fra­struc­ture is also among the framework con­di­tions. This mainly relates to the de­ploy­ment of suitable EDP systems. Software and hardware should enable employees to shape both contact with customers as well as internal or­gan­isa­tion in the best possible way.

Let’s say you sell mugs with prints on them. One of your customers has the problem that the print has already started fading after a few wash cycles. They are rightly angry about it. You have indicated various options directly on the packaging for getting in touch with your company in the event of a complaint, so the customer contacts your hotline.

The support employee’s task now consists of making the un­sat­is­fied customer happy again. To do this, they first listen closely to the complaint and ask sensible questions: For one thing, this em­phas­ises the level of ser­i­ous­ness with which the company responds to the complaint. In addition, the employee also receives important in­form­a­tion that they’ll need for the next steps.

The questions can also clarify to what extent support can directly help the customer. In many situ­ations, such as in technical support, employees can provide as­sist­ance and resolve the problem. But that can’t be done in our example: The print is already gone. At most, the employee is able to give tips on how to take care of the mugs in the future. However, in order to im­me­di­ately com­pensate the customer, the employee gives them a voucher. The customer can use this to order another mug of their choice at no extra cost.

The indirect processes are underway at the same time: While eval­u­at­ing the complaint, it becomes clear that the deficient printing mostly happens with a very specific type of mug. This in­form­a­tion is then com­mu­nic­ated to the ap­pro­pri­ate pro­duc­tion division. Auditors monitor the op­er­a­tions and determine that the complaint man­age­ment processes are operating very well. However, the majority of com­plaints are received via the hotline; and it is more cost-effective to handle com­plaints via an online form. For this reason, the decision is made to promote the latter channel more pro­act­ively going forward and to simplify the form.

All the in­form­a­tion ends up in a report. Because this report is geared toward third parties who aren’t part of complaint man­age­ment, it is the task of reporting to prepare all required in­form­a­tion in a way that it is easy to interpret. As a result, the company ex­ec­ut­ives increase the budget for complaint man­age­ment and instruct the lab to ex­per­i­ment with other dyes in order to improve dur­ab­il­ity.

If you follow the pro­ced­ures in your complaint man­age­ment, then you already have a solid system in place. However, we have compiled some extra tips for you so you can win over your customers with excellent service.

A com­plain­ing customer is not a nuisance, but an op­por­tun­ity. You learn important in­form­a­tion about your products or services from their feedback. Fur­ther­more, you provide the person with an outlet: When their anger subsides and they then receive sat­is­fact­ory support from you, they’ll most likely perceive your company as customer-focused. Customers who are un­sat­is­fied and don’t even notify you are far worse. This is because you have probably lost them for good and don’t even know the reason. This is why you should ab­so­lutely ask your customer base to provide feedback on products, your service, or the company as a whole.

To be sure, everyone likes to receive positive feedback, but continued de­vel­op­ment works better when flaws are pointed out. This is why you should make it as easy as possible for your customers to address a concern with you. Make them feel that their opinion really is important.

If a customer voices their dis­sat­is­fac­tion, you should first of all let them express their concern (or calmly read their message). Don’t make the mistake of placating the customer before you can even com­pre­hend their problem. Of­ten­times, however, the customer can’t specify the exact cause of their anger. This is why follow-up questions are also con­sidered an essential part of listening. By doing this, you show the customer that you are in­ter­ested and can also gather important in­form­a­tion for improving your product.

Few things annoy an already un­sat­is­fied customer as much as being stuck forever in a telephone queue. But that doesn’t mean that companies should only respond as quickly as possible to customers con­tact­ing them by phone. They should also focus on re­spond­ing as quickly as possible to customer concerns expressed in e-mail and social media feedback. Otherwise the customer’s anger continues to grow and even­tu­ally reaches the point at which damage control is no longer possible. If a company has es­tab­lished a clear system for complaint man­age­ment, however, this type of problem shouldn’t actually occur.

Once in a while it appears that the problem did not originate with your company or product but with the customer them­selves. However, you should never tell them this. There are two reasons for this: Obviously, it isn’t a good idea to blame customers who are already upset and angry, es­pe­cially since they are con­trib­ut­ing to your company’s success with their payment. Secondly, their complaint can also con­trib­ute to improving your offering. Perhaps the operating in­struc­tions can be made simpler or com­mu­nic­a­tion across the board must be improved. Either way, you should assume full re­spons­ib­il­ity for the problem.

On the one hand, an un­sat­is­fied customer would like to vent their frus­tra­tion on you. On the other hand, however, they need a solution to their problem. That’s why it’s not enough to only show un­der­stand­ing. Offer sensible solutions – prefer­ably before the customer makes their own demands. This way you maintain control and can also better determine the accruing costs of com­pens­a­tion. Re­gard­less of how important the customer is, you can also customise the solution according to the customer.

Please note the legal dis­claim­er relating to this article.