Today I had the frustrating experience of trying to get in touch with the people at Cinemark, who own the movie theater across the street in the Clackamas Town Center.  Why frustrating?  Well, it so happens that I own a ticket to the midnight showing of the Hobbit for 12:01 Friday morning, and the Clackamas Town Center will not re-open until 9:00 Friday morning after the deadly shootings there on Monday [1].  What was frustrating was that information that should have taken a very short time to find took several attempts of navigating their website (which is not exactly very customer friendly) as well as a spectacularly unsuccessful attempt to call their customer service line, which ran me around in circles and would not get me in touch with a live human being.  Eventually I managed to find an alert that said that they will honor exchanges throughout the weekend once the theater opens or at a nearby theater that I can’t get to because none of the train or bus lines are leaving Clackamas Town Center until tomorrow morning.

Why is good customer service so difficult to find?  I don’t think I’m that difficult to please as a customer goes.  I am very exact in what I want, generally not in a big hurry, and generally patient with anyone who gives a good effort in difficult circumstances.  Being a person who tends to have habits and patterns, I like it when a restaurant and its staff is sufficiently well trained to provide sweet tea with no lemon when I get to my table, and to ask which of my regular items I will be ordering.  But other than restaurants (where I have a great deal of positive experiences), my experiences with customer service have generally been difficult and unpleasant.

It would appear that in many cases customer service is poor simply because it is not valued by the company.  Waiters and waitresses value good service because it directly affects their bottom line–good service means a good tip, and that makes a big difference.  Especially when someone like myself develops a reputation with the local restaurants for being a regular (and being a creature of habit, this is not too difficult to accomplish), the knowledge that service is not a one-time deal but part of a lengthy relationship makes service even more critical.  It is clear that as far as service goes, those services where tipping is the most common would be those service experiences that are the most pleasant (hair cuts are another example where I have generally had decent experience, but tipping does help there also).

But it is fairly rare for customer service to pay.  Sometimes payment schemes are directly contrary to good customer service.  For example, a salesman whose whole income depends on commission is going to say and do what is necessary to get commission, and may be more interested (if he is not an ethical person) in those products that will earn him the most rather than those who will serve the interests of customers.  In general customer service employees are poorly paid, have few resources, and low respect and status.  They do not feel valued, customers do not feel valued, and companies lose a lot of goodwill as a result of their failure to properly avoid and respond to customer problems.

In cases where there are few competitors for business, it may not be possible for customers to find really good customer service with few options.  Nonetheless, many of the customers of those companies will be “soft” customers and will be prone to leave if a better option presents itself.  In certain industries (phone service springs to mind, as does anything involving lost or stolen items), customer service is so nearly uniformly bad that any company who is able to provide friendly or even civil customer service–or a human being to talk to easily, is going to have a major competitive advantage against its competitors.

What does this suggest?  For one, customer service pays in happier and more loyal customers.  Problem prevention is best (this requires a fair bit of foresight), but the ability to own up to problems and make things right works wonders as well.  But for customer service to pay for companies, those who provide customer service also need to get paid for the service they provide.  Whether they are well-paid and well-respected by their companies or they receive tips from customers and have self-interest in ensuring good customer service, it would appear that if a company wants a reputation for good customer service, it can put its money where its mouth is.  A lot of companies could use a lot of help.

[1] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2012/12/12/trouble-on-my-street/