Customer Services, it Takes Examples

¶ … customer services, it takes examples of scenarios where customer services have been excellent and in places where it is very awful. It also provides many methodologies which an organization (like rehabilitation center) can apply to improve customer service, it mentions of Total Quality Management (TQM), some basic principles as well as others methods for bringing an appropriate system which deals with customers properly. Case study of Hospital Now, let's have a look at the case study of a scenario involving a hospital and its customer service.

Recently, I had the experience of a customer service from a hospital which was treating my mother who suffered from stroke. I had the opportunity to closely monitor the customer service which will be described here. Firstly, the complain monitoring and receiving system was great, from the moment I made my first call I was started to feel its impact on me. There was no annoying answering machine, instead a lady with a charming voice replied me with a positive focus towards my problem.

It was for the guidance of the steps and procedures that I have to follow in order to do a proper subscription in the hospital. At the arrival in hospital, there seemed a complete sort out system which is easy to understand for all the necessities. I had to go through a simple documentation process regarding the patient, what problem is the patient suffering from besides other details and which department I should be heading towards.

I was provided with a list of medical professionals who were available for the help, in case one is not present then the other can be contacted with minimal disturbance. After admitting my mother there all the responsibility was taken by the hospital. The positive attitude of the Doctors and other medical professionals in dealing with the critical situation of my mother helped me a lot. They assured me from the start that there is nothing to be worried about and everything is under control.

The overall working environment there was also great, everyone seemed to be helping others from different departments. It was the impression set by them that make me so relaxed at a time which should have been very frustrating. Their professional attitude suggested that they have dealt with situations more critical than this before. The head medical examiner of my mother took me as a friend from the first meeting, we even shared contact numbers and other detailed information.

He told me personally that nothing is to worry about and my mother will be fine. The medications provided by the hospital were also not very expensive considering my limited finances. They even offered it to me for free considering my situation. Maybe it was their attitude to bring up a positive impression of them towards their customers, even if it was it worked very well.

I was so impressed by their generosity and level of commitment that I will recommend all of my friends, colleagues and other relatives to prefer that hospital not only because of their medical services but the customer care they provided. Some other facilities there which really impressed me were the response time their ambulances took in cases of severe emergency. The medical equipment that they used was also the latest and the most effective for saving lives.

The environment of the hospital was just like that of a home, there were many different other services available there for the visitors. There was a separate playing field for children, a room of billiards for adults, a swimming pool, a separate reading section (library), and an indoor basketball arena. Sometimes, I even took leave from work not just to attend my mother but to take avail of the other facilities that were provided by them for the visitors.

It was truly an amazing experience, something I will remember for the rest of my life. Case Study for Transfer to Rehabilitation Centre After proper consultation from the Doctors at the hospital, I was advised to move to a rehabilitation centre since my mother's condition was improving and the hospital was running out of resources in terms of Doctors to properly look after all the arriving patients (since there were so many of them which kept on coming).

This is where all the major problems started to happen, the main problem arose when dealing with two agencies for the social services which my mother was receiving. Firstly, the rehabilitation centre's way to respond towards complaints was very annoying, there was this answering machine which did not even knew how to solve many critical problems on phone which made me to drive to the agency for proper consultation.

After my arrival there I found out that since my mother's healthcare coverage is from a different agency (MEDICARE Retirement Benefits) I will have to go there as well and bring some required attested document copies from their staff if I want to avail the services of the rehabilitation centre. There seemed to be no coordination between the two agencies even if they were serving for the same purpose which was terrible.

I was made to travel to MEDICARE many times because the necessary staff was at most times not present who could avail me with all of my demands. Even after all the main documents were provided by me to the rehabilitation centre, it took them a lot of time to process that information and provide the result. The coordination level among different departments in the rehabilitation centre seemed very terrible. It was like they are all separated from each other.

There even wasn't any place where I can log an official complaint regarding all the matters that I have been through, the employees of the rehabilitation centre seemed very awkward in their attitude, most of them were on voluntary services and maybe were not paid properly by the agency, that is why they did not take proper considerations to help the customers very efficiently. Their attitude lacked a lot of basic things and it was very lackluster as compared to the behavior I saw back in the hospital.

Also, there seemed to be a huge gap between the top level management and the employees at the rehabilitation centre, the management hold the complete authority of all the things and the employees were not asked of their opinion or feedback. It was completely different from the hospital where empowerment at all levels was observed and the employees at all departments were encouraged to play more roles in decision making. Here, it seemed that the decision is firmly under the control of the management.

I also observed that the incentives for employees at the rehabilitation centre were very terrible, some officials I talked to there told me that they worked there because they had no other option for a job. Many complained about the management on how it was running the place and their lack of interest in putting up a quality level customer service.

The medical professional there were also very dull and non-cooperative as compared to the Doctors of the hospital I visited, their level of care towards the patients disappointed me hugely and made a very inappropriate impression on other visitors as well. Total Quality Management for Customer Service Let's have a look on how to approach the customer through systems approach, here the concepts of Total Quality Management (TQM) holds a significant position in providing management styles which shapes the staff and customer satisfaction.

It is a model which leaves the old top-down model aside and focuses on continuous improvement. It also has a decentralized decision-making process which focuses the customer. Since about ninety percent of a firm's problems are related to the process, not the employees, "TQM focuses on processes which give result for the satisfaction of the customer" (Zemke & Woods, 1998). It involves a shift from outcomes to processes.

Its main processes are data collection, data analysis, diagrams such as cause and effect, flow charts and other methods which help the firm's members to determine how to improve the process. The objective is professional quality management which establishes internal and external customer satisfaction. Following are some points of TQM, which makes the employees better in serving the customer by providing better service.

Firstly, the proper customer focus where users themselves define what is required by them, then no tolerance for mistakes or work which do not give value to products and services. The focus should be on prevention of problems.

Fact-based decision using hard data and scientific procedures be used, usage of long-term planning focused on improving performance, simultaneous design of total product or service life cycle by many different employees of functional areas, proper teamwork involving employees, vendors, specialists, customers and other agencies, continuous improvement of every point of the order of work, structure based on maximizing value added to products and services and partnerships of long-term obligations based on quality and continuous improvement.

As a firm develops a TQM, it starts to set targets for performance, whatever the targets are, it is necessary for a pre-defined team to address the issues. The employees should be firmly committed to the firm, they are the face of a firm (also its eyes and ears). The staff focus should be involved in the process management, also their measurement and knowledge as well as initial contact with customers, all contribute to the performance of the organization.

Firms need to provide results on a consistent basis, be innovative and should respond quickly to any changes in environment for giving exceptional results and satisfying customers. Further in continuous improvement, aspects such as redesign of processes or services, upgraded technology systems, proper paperwork should be focused upon. Continuous improvement requires all firms' members to look for opportunities to improve. Overall, the continuous improvement process involves customers, leadership, employees and quality. It is the customers who determine if the firm is providing quality. They are the judges of it.

The leadership is useful for setting direction of the firm. It is responsible for making high level performance. Let's review the basic continuous improvement model, identifying the problems then search the causes, plan on the improvement then implement it and observe the progress. Performance measurement for consideration includes short-term, medium term and long-term outcomes, efficiency in cost management and services and the proper process measures. Now, let's focus on the design or redesigning of processes, Firstly the opportunity should be studied properly, then the need to explain the quality attributes.

The end user or customer should be contacted to determine its wants from the service or product. Once information is received from within and outside the firm then a proper Gap Analysis should be done. This involves observing at the gaps between the current functionality of the firm and the desires, wants or expectations from the end user (customer) of the firm.

If the Gap analysis predicts a failure in meeting the customer's expectations, then proper solutions should be looked out for the desired problem, this may require many different creative techniques for the solution of problem be applied, then determine on how to test the improvements. Finally the implementation comes. A proper team should be assigned for the implementation plan and for the timeline for operations. Let's focus on empowerment in TQM, it is the transfer of authority in a firm to the bottom most level.

It makes personnel at bottom levels of the firm to contribute towards decision making which was usually done by the top level management. This empowerment helps the firm's personnel to improve the process and give services which benefit the customer. Employees are a great resource, they should be supported by proper empowerment. Their work should get proper recognition. Quality is a huge aspect of services, it should be combined more efficiently to the services produced.

Now a days, almost all major firms in the Western hemisphere have different types of empowerment techniques in them. Finally, let's focus on the communication component. The communication process is very crucial for giving appropriate service to customer. This process involves seven major elements, the main speaker, the message it conveys, the communication channel, the target listener, feedback attained, interference and the complete situation. The speaking manner is crucial here, the speaker must make the listener understand what is said.

Transmitting a message includes the message itself, selection of words, tone of voice, complete appearance (if any), gestures, body language, facial expressions and the eye contact. The speaker must ensure that the nonverbal message is not distracting the listener away from the main spoken message. Every message should be filtered, listener's scope includes its total knowledge, experience and main goals.

The speaker should ensure the listener understands the message by focusing on its scope of reference, furthermore the speaker should know of the verbal and non-verbal gestures which are understood by the customer. Negative gestures should be avoided, calling by name is considered as a positive gesture. Always remember that customers want to be treated respectfully, they also need positive interaction and attitude. The speaker should put proper attention to what they are saying.

The E-government factor in communication is growing at huge pace which involves modern methods of communications such a through e-mail or telecommunications rather than meeting in person. It is encouraged because technology is easily available and it is very cheap and convenient to use. You can easily emulate the main business which applied technology, it shifts the main work form the company towards the customer by reducing many company workloads, saving huge proportions of money, increasing the overall productivity and in many cases reducing the workforce.

Customer Services Essentials Following are some main points which the organization can use to make more efficient decisions on customer services, firstly identify the customer type. "External customers are the end users of the main type of services and the internal customers are those which lie inside the firm depending on different departments for services."(Brown,1998).

The firm needs to take advantage of the customers who fits in their scope and focus on satisfying that specific set of population, these are the main primary customers and the foremost source of income to the firm. The process of customer satisfaction involves meeting or exceeding the end user's expectations from the product.

Some characteristics which help in determining the order of satisfaction from the customer are as follows, ease in availability of services, the comprehension of the services provided, the reliability of services (does the firm fulfills it's obligations on what it claims?), Responsiveness (how quickly the firm respond and react to the customer's wants and desires?), the timing of services and competence (discusses the accuracy of service). Companies and firms should not confuse customer service with the customer satisfaction.

The satisfaction factor is measured by the customer themselves, customer satisfaction has influence on the entire set of operations conducted by the company, in either short or long-term planning the main input from the customer is essential to determine the upcoming direction of the entire firm. Information provided by the customer makes the firm to better determine outcomes and results which can aid in decision making and overall planning whereas the companies set the service measures which are more often done regardless of the desires of the customer.

Service measures are implemented on taking note of the most recent experiences available. The continuous improvement factor is labeled as process improvement and is very critical for development of customer services. Processes are simply ways to do a work, they have inputs in the form of data, once entered the data is transformed from the process into the necessary output required.

The outputs of the processes can be inputs to another units, this chain can go on and on until the final desired result is obtained, feedback loops are created within these chains between the processes, here the improvement factors comes to effect. There are many ways to find out what the customer wants, some of those methodologies are as follows, qualitative research which focuses on selected hypothesis and searches data to reply to question, a selected statement of problem is required here.

The firm should also define the aim of the research. Quantitative research which quantifies information obtained from a targeted set of individuals, it includes interviews, surveys designed to get selected information (the questions may ask to choose from a set of options in surveys). This research in most cases samples the population. There are many informal research techniques such as administrative information, complaints, complements and suggestions (where customers provide information on a regular basis by the complaint system) and informal interviews.

Other methods for research are through focus groups, different kinds of open surveys (which includes personal interviews, telephone interviews and written questionnaires). Once results are obtained from the source, the data analyzing begins (e.g. analyzing a survey by a rating scale from 1 to 5 where 1 is the lowest score and 5 is the highest). Also, there is a need to assure the obtained information from the analysis is reliable.

Some more Principles for Proper Customer Service "The ability to satisfy the wants and desires of the customers properly is considered as lifeblood of the business."(Buttle, 2004). There are many ways for customer satisfaction such as offering discounts to attract more customers or to make existing customers spend more by other offers. "The business holder should always make efforts to make the.