Do Your Frontline Staff Look At Things From The Customer’s Perspective
Recently I travelled to Tasmania on business and stayed at the Mid City Motel. I was there for 2 nights and the motel room itself is quite well appointed. The lady on reception was a little bit vague when I checked in. I got up to the floor and the swipe cards that had been presented didn’t work but housekeeping were there cleaning out other rooms and let me in and were quite friendly. I went back downstairs thereafter and the check in lady (reception lady) corrected the cards. so this point in time I’m still neither extremely happy or in no way could I say that I was unhappy. In the room it advertised that breakfast was a buffet breakfast available in the restaurant on the ground floor.
The next day I went downstairs to the restaurant and I couldn’t see the buffet breakfast so I asked the lady present and I was told no we don’t have buffet breakfast you just order al-a-carte. I’m thinking to myself that this is a little odd as it was contrary to the information in the room. But then it started to deteriorate from there. I was asked as to what room I was in and I stated the room 506 and she went off to her computer and came back to me and said nobody is in 506. I said well I am and showed her the envelope with the swipe cards in it that quite clearly showed that I was in 506. She asked for my surname went off and came back and said “No, you’re not in 506 you’re actually in 603.” I said “Well I am in 506, but obviously your computer system is saying 603.”
The upshot of the conversation was that this lady did not in any way believe that I was in 506. So that I could actually enjoy breakfast I signed the voucher as 603 and I’m thinking the poor person in 603 is going to end up with my breakfast bill, but I’ll go to reception straight after breakfast and sort it out. So after the breakfast I went to the reception and I was told by the person there that I was in room 603 despite me quite clearing saying where I was and the envelope. But they continued to disbelieve me.
The next day at breakfast again I thought “No, I’m not going to go to the motel’s breakfast service.” So I went off to a restaurant elsewhere to have breakfast, rather than argue which room I was in; so the business lost that service. Then I came to checkout, which could have been … well a tad intriguing. And once again I was told I wasn’t in 506, but 603. To which I then asked “Was there a difference in room rate?” And there was – $20 a night difference, so then an argument ensured to prove I was in 506 which after a few minutes they finally amended the bill to reflect that I was in 506 and I checked out.
The upshot of all this is that at no time did anybody that I dealt with try to actually take the situation in hand and resolve it. Customer service was not even in the consideration. The computer must be right, the customer must not have a clue as to which room he is in.
So the little thing of the sign in the room about the buffet breakfast became a big issue, because suddenly you are looking at everything.
Now I am telling the world and using the experience as an example of poor customer service. The attitude from the people was not of trying to help but rather it was “customer get away, you don’t have any idea, you are a pain”.
They did not even try to look at it from the customers perspective.
Do your frontline staff look at things from the customer’s perspective? How many clients are you annoying because of your systems and processes? How many customers are you turning away? Not because of necessarily hugely bad service, but just because of an attitude of ‘we are right, the customer is wrong’. I think lessons can be learnt from this example that in no way did they try to distinguish themselves from other accommodation in the town, but rather had the attitude of the customer is wrong. Suffice to say, I won’t stay there again and suffice to say that I’m recommending to everybody else to look at alternative accommodation.
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