Are we still in the customer is always right era?

[Rich_Marley]

So recently i had a meeting with one of my team members who had a spat with one of the customers and the customer lodged a complaint regarding the behaviour, where as my team mate claims to only react when things got out of hands. Even if it was the fault of my colleague do you not think think we live in a time were the customers must also adhere to a set of rules also. So are we still living in the age of customer is always right?

 

[VirtualGlobalPhone]

Rich_Marley , This experience depends on "Product / Service" - "Common Knowledge" already their in the market.

These kind of argument / debates happens between company employee and customer on new prod and services. In this scenario customer care need to focus on helping to make it into "Common Knowledge". Its quite challenging but that's one get pad by customer.

So keeping this in mind customer is always RIGHT. or you help them to be always RIGHT. Because its his / her RIGHTEOUS MINDSET always brings more sales and becomes addictive.

Hope you got it.

 

[Dora Wi]

While in many cases it is better for the business to believe the customer and do what they expect you to do, there is also a chance that the customer is dishonest or has unrealistic expectations. It really depends on the situation.

For example, if you work at a restaurant and a customer claims one of the items has been left out of their order, it's better for the business to just give them that item, because the possibility that the customer is dishonest and walks off with an extra item is less damaging than the scenario where the customer is honest but you don't believe them - in this case you might lose the customer and/or generate some bad online reviews.

But if there is a significant amount of money or other resources involved, it might not be that simple, and we have to look at whether the customer is really right. Contracts and terms of service should include things that define the rights and realistic expectations a customer may have, and if they are in violation of those terms, they are technically not right.

 

[djbaxter]

Agreed. It's not really a question of whether the customer is always right — frequently, they are very clearly wrong. It's more a question of making things right with the customer or agreeing to disagree if that's not possible.

The company should not necessarily take the customer's side in terms of punishing or disciplining or terminating the employee. But fighting with customers is going to hurt, not help your company. These days this often applies to Google or Yelp reviews: if you get a negative review, you as the business owner or CEO should respond to that in a way which corrects any misinformation but does not attack the customer: that's not a good look for any business.

Don't worry about "winning" with a difficult customer. If you can find a way to let the customer think s/he won, then you actually win. Even when you and the entire world knows that customer is being unreasonable, offering a discount or coupon for future products or services will buy you a lot of positive PR, especially since the customer probably won't take you up on the offer.

 

[gwen]

I thought we are in the era now that we all can agree to say that "CUSTOMERS ARE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT. BUT THEY HAVE ALL THE RIGHT" This article from Forbes even a bit old really finds it golden.

 

[twinkle]

‘The customer is always right’ is a popular phrase attributed to a variety of turn-of-the-century American retail pioneers. It's not about doing whatever the customer asks, but listening to customers and going the extra mile to understand their needs.

We should be in "the customer is always right" era. Sadly, people now thinks this is an excuse to get what they want out of a business. Karens use this phrase to get away with being a bad example to other, especially to the younger generations.

 

[Dora Wi]

‘The customer is always right’ is a popular phrase attributed to a variety of turn-of-the-century American retail pioneers. It's not about doing whatever the customer asks, but listening to customers and going the extra mile to understand their needs.

We should be in "the customer is always right" era. Sadly, people now thinks this is an excuse to get what they want out of a business. Karens use this phrase to get away with being a bad example to other, especially to the younger generations.

I agree, it is definitely a problem when a cusomer is behaving too entitled. But bad customers happen regardless of what policies we employ.
Sadly I also see a lot of companies that don't really follow this mindset, sometimes there is no proper customer service at all, which can be really frustrating.