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Is
Your Customer Service That Good?: a Customer Service Article by Charles Marshall
Enjoy Is
your customer service that good,
a
customer service article by Charles Marshall. After completing the article, we invite you to read additional more motivational and customer service article selections from our
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Is Your Customer Service That Good?
I walked out to my car a few days ago and saw a 6’x3’
puddle of reddish-brown liquid underneath my car. Ask any car expert and
they’ll tell you right away that this is not a good thing. It usually means
some type of transmission problem. Ask that same car expert and he’ll they you
that these things don’t just magically get better all by themselves.
So I was faced with a problem. What to do? And, more
specifically, where to take this car to get it fixed?
The problem is that I’m not a car guy, never have been
a car guy, and never aspire to be a car guy. Fortunately, though, I knew just
what to do. I’d call “my guy” and he’d know what to do.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned in life, it’s you
need “a guy” to call when you need something. Preferably, several “guys”
representing various areas of your life: car, home, finances, spirituality,
exercise, etc.
The funny thing is that I didn’t have “a car guy” until
just last week. When my wife picked me up from the airport, she told me the
battery was threatening to die. I was going back out of town early the next
morning so I needed to get the battery fixed before I left, and it was already
late in the day. I called a local repair shop near my home and asked when they
closed. The owner answered they closed in 15 minutes, but told me to go ahead
and bring it in anyway and he would “take care of me.”
Hmmmm. When I’ve had car repair shops make this offer
in this past it usually meant I got walloped in my wallet. I decided to chance
it anyway because I was in a bind. I got stuck in traffic and wound up not
making it to the car shop until 20 minutes after they closed,
The owner seemed unperturbed, though, and had a new
battery in my car before you could say, “Will that be cash or credit?” Much to
my surprise, the owner waived the installation charge, charging me only for
the battery. Then he gave me his business card, wrote his cell number on the
back and told me to give him a call if I got in trouble again.
So, let’s take inventory.
1] Kept shop open well past closing time
2] Waived installation charge on car battery
3] Gave me his cell phone number and offered to come
running at any time of the day.
Oh, and it’s important to mention that I’m 99% sure
that the car shop owner didn’t know he was talking to a professional speaker
who regularly writes and speaks on the subject of customer service.
So, when my transmission fluid leak appeared, I not
only had “a guy,” I had his cell phone number, too.
When I called and told him what was going on with my
car, and reminded him of what he did for me just a few days prior, it took him
a moment to remember who I was. That means¾and this is the really important
point I’m getting to here¾that the behavior he exhibited wasn’t some rare
instance when he went out of the way for a stranger.
No, that behavior is who he is.
His customer service attitude of doing what it takes¾no
matter whether that means inconveniencing himself by keeping his shop open a
little longer or making himself available by giving me his cell number and
thus making me, the customer, feel that he really cares¾that attitude is
something that he practices 24 hours a day.
The person who practices that kind of customer service
won’t have to worry too much about a recession. I know plenty of businesses
that are not only surviving in this economic environment but prospering. How
are they doing it? By establishing themselves and their businesses at the
go-to destinations for best-quality care and value for dollar spent.
After I told the owner the type of car problem I was
having, he told me that, since they don’t normally handle transmission
problems, they might not be the best shop to take my car to. He offered
instead to take a look at my car to help narrow the list of things that might
be wrong with it (which, by the way, he did and, you guessed it, didn’t charge
me for) and then helped to facilitate my car’s transportation to a
transmission shop.
Where do you think I’m going the next time I need car
service?
© 2010 Charles Marshall. Charles Marshall is a nationally known humorous
motivational speaker and author. Visit his Web site at http://www.charlesmarshall.net
or contact him via e-mail at charles@charlesmarshall.net.
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