I wrote this post before most places were shutting down for the coronavirus, but I believe that once the social restrictions are lifted, the difference between those companies that bounce back and those that don’t will be in part linked to those that understand Anti-Customer Service.
This is 2020 and every retail place in America knows that the customer experience is all that stands between you and doom. Or, maybe they don’t and that’s why many long standing businesses like Sears are closing shops. I remember a customer complaint on Yelp that was pretty bad, actually a rarity for my old company. We reviewed surveillance footage and while it wasn’t as bad as she claimed, it was not up to our standards. The customer probably had a few too many, but she wasn’t obnoxious or anything. They even took a selfie in our store. Yet the employee treated them like they were a burden to him.
The problem a lot of salespeople have is that they will sometimes get into an “us vs. them” mentality. You’ve probably seen some of the retail worker memes out there. People who take joy in not giving the customer what they want out of spite. “I’ll never shop here again!” “Great, thanks bye!” This is Anti-Customer Service.
Anti-customer service is just like it sounds, it is the opposite of customer service. Where customer service is all about making the customer happy, Anti-Customer Service is about making the employee happy. It is also characterized by being adversarial with the customer. Are they trying to “pull a fast one”?
Also, Anti-Customer Service is not always about employees. Companies can have policies in place that are Anti-Customer. Think about your cable company or your cell phone company. I’m sure you can think of policies that you’ve encountered that do not have your best interest in mind. How many times have you argued only to be told, “that’s just policy”? We discussed a little of this in a previous post, Is the customer always right?
So I want to share two things you should stress when coaching your sales staff to avoid Anti-Customer Service:
- It is okay to treat a thief like a customer, but don’t treat a customer like a thief.
- This may be the millionth time you’ve done this, but it might be their first.
Customers not Thieves
The first lesson is very important. We actually witnessed this happen. One of our star employees helped this gentleman pick out several products, showed him how each worked, had him up at the counter ready to check out (even put the products in a gift bag), and he just ran with the stuff. She gave this thief probably the best customer service he’s ever had.
The thing is you can’t actually tell who a thief is. And if you think you can spot a thief, you may want to check that you’re not just being racist or classist. The key is to just give good customer service to everyone. A thief will be uncomfortable trying to steal if they know you’re out on the floor and aware of them. Most of the thieves we caught via surveillance usually do so because they know the sales associate is not going to be on the floor AT ALL.
Further, nothing hurts your image more than treating an innocent person as if they are guilty. Just last week we watched one of our employees treat someone blatantly like a thief. This can be made 100X worse if the customers you think are thieves are people of color. Until someone actually pockets an item, they are customers, not thieves.
1,000,000:1
The second point came from my friend Shannon. This advice applies to literally every situation and every encounter with people, from salespeople to cops, from doctors to tech support. This might be the millionth time you’ve had to deal with this, but it might be their first time coming to you with this problem. You deal with people every day who may try to get a refund when they obviously can’t, but this may be the first time this PARTICULAR customer needed a refund. By assuming someone’s motivations before they’ve even finished their story you’re setting up a situation where you’re going to leave a customer very unhappy. Our owner fired an employee because during their check-in calls he was always talking about stopping someone who “tried to get one over on him”. How can we expect him to deliver good customer service if he is suspicious of literally everyone who walks in the door?
To give an example of how to do things right, I’ll share the tale of buying pet food with my friend Andrea. She was being rung up before me and the item she was purchasing had an “on-sale” sticker on the shelf. I’m not sure where the error was, but it rang up at regular price. Andrea mentioned she thought it was on sale for $10. The sales associate didn’t argue or even do a price check, he just took her word for it and changed the price. Why assume that she’s lying to get a better deal. Most people if told this was a policy would be like, “yes, but what if someone abuses this policy”. My answer, there will be a pattern, and then we’ll catch it. If they abuse this policy, we’re still getting their money. If they are a rewards memeber, then they are choosing you over another place, and you have their data so if they abuse a policy, you can find out.
The key to defeating Anti-Customer Service is to identify attitudes and policies that lead to putting a customer on the wrong side of an “us vs. them” situation. If you notice these two behaviors happening at your company, take steps to correct the behavior and remind your associates that they are on the same side as their customers. It is always better to err on the side of the customer, than lose a customer forever because your employee is “protecting” your business. Go out tomorrow and try to eliminate any Anti-Customer Service policies you may have.
Joe Robles 