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A customer care policy is a legally binding document that is designed to help the customer care staff stay on the same track. It provides advice, guidance, and illustrations of how to make sure customer satisfaction. It is a group of policies and procedures that direct the organization's entire customer support approach. In short, it's a handbook that informs management how it can treat its customers fairly and in an efficient manner. If you want your support team to follow this unwritten principle of corporate etiquette, you need to implement policies in your organization today.
Don't get work done through in-house email chains. Most corporate policies prohibit employee communication methods such as chain mails or text messaging, so you need to enforce yours. Otherwise, every time an angry customer sends you a criticism via mail, you'll be tempted to reply within an in-kind manner. That won't do you or your business any good.
The expense of outsourced customer service agents is another place where many companies overlook. Yes, outsourcing is often the most inexpensive way to get work done. But your reputation will suffer if you outsource too many tasks to too few folks. Too many outsourced customer service agents may lead to lost customer referrals and - eventually - bad word-of-mouth. Because of this, there are loads of legal penalties for sending out unsolicited email.
Give customers what they expect. If your company isn't notorious for giving customers exactly what they paid for when they buy from you, then you've got room to improve your customer service policies. By way of example, never make promises to your clients that you don't intend to keep. For example, don't promise to fix an issue with your product which you hope to get rid of within five minutes only to discover that you still have it! Your customer will realize as a dishonest promise, and they'll want you to keep that promise to them.
Real-time help is an issue that all businesses face these days. While you may have some in-house technical support, outsourcing your telephone center to a different company can speed up the process of getting assistance to your customers' desks. And when your real-time representatives can answer questions in real time, it makes it more probable that they will refer customers to a salesperson for follow-up service. Both options are mutually beneficial.
As stated above, one other important factor in your goal to ensure client success is to regularly update your policies and processes. So as to keep your clients happy, you will need to learn what issues or topics keep coming up. One of the simplest ways to do this is to solicit comments from your customer base. Speak with them about their real-life adventures and see what solutions they can bring to your problem. Then, incorporate those ideas into your own policies and procedures.
Finally, you must have clearly defined policies and procedures to guarantee compliance. You can use a template, or produce your own, but it's best to have one standard coverage covering each of the different facets of your business. In addition, it's important to include both written and unwritten instructions for your customer service representatives to follow. To put it differently, be sure to include any instructions that apply to them such as"Do not take over two minutes to answer a query,""Please provide your contact information only when requested," and so on. Contain both written and unwritten rules for not following these directions, as well as any penalties for breaking them.
Having a customer service policy in place can make a huge difference in how your company is perceived by customers. In addition, customer satisfaction always helps your bottom line. In fact, many studies indicate that customer satisfaction increases your probability of increasing sales by up to 15 percent. Also, customer service representatives often work in close cooperation with other members of their management group. This means your company is well-run as a whole because no single individual has complete control over every facet of it.