A Season of Goodwill thought

[#1]

As we approach the season of goodwill perhaps we should think of the staff on the end of the Customer Support telephone line. My last experience was during the debacle when PN reduced our fibre upload speed to 10Mbps but failed to increase the download to 55Mbps. This made me quite cross so I rang PN. After waiting for a considerable time listening to awful music this had escalated from being cross to being angry. I then got through to a poor chap who obviously knew nothing about PNs decision to change the speed and flatly denied any such thing had happened. By this time I was ready to tear the poor guy’s head off. On reflection, it was not his fault that his leaders had not given him advanced notice of the changes, neither was it his fault that PN are so understaffed in this area, which resulted in the wait. Further consideration into why they are always understaffed made me wonder if people who reacted like me are partly responsible – I would not want to spend my working day doing my best to remain civil whilst trying to placate angry people then trying to resolve their problems. PN keep telling us that they are recruiting staff but are unlikely to tell us if that is simply to replace those who have found a better job rather than increasing their skills and knowledge in this environment.

So my proposed New Year resolution: Should I need to ring customer support (and I earnestly hope I won’t need to) I shall try and be patient and be nice to the poor devil on the PN end of the line who I’m sure will be doing their best.

I did apologise at the time for losing it!

[#2]

PN have been telling us for YEARS !!!!! they are recruiting ,,, BUT THEY NEVER SUCCEEDED

[#3]

maybe they are constantly recruiting, but they are also losing the same amount of staff at the same time?
i would suspect that their employee churn is quite high.

[#4]

Exactly my point. I cannot see this as being a pleasant work environment when every person on the other end of the phone is cheesed off with the wait. Now if PN were to retrain those who answer the sales phone lines to customer support roles and make potential new customers hang on for 40 minutes then that would be a start on doing existing customers proud! 

[#5]

It takes a lot of patience in dealing with irate customers within any business and one of the most important aspects is actually listening to them. Also it is good to remember that although the customer may initially sound angry at the advisor it is actually the service or business that they have their grievance with so need to remain calm and not rise to any challenging language.

I have, when working in a similar environment, told the caller that if the language and tone persists I may have to terminate the call but am prepared to listen and help as best as I can if they just take a moment to collect their thoughts. Let's face it, the angrier a caller gets the less articulate their speech becomes.

[#6]

You are absolutely right that the staff are not the company, but the customer has to ask "then who is?". The CEO, the shareholders? Someone is driving the company so that it gets much wrong, so who does the customer chastise, when they have had poor performasnce, issues not addressed, wrong information given and sometimes just told lies? Where else is the customer able to actually vent some of the anger that PN generates in it's customers?

The rep on the phone is just that a representative of the company and therefore defacto THE company to that customer. If they don't like that then don't work for them and if PN don't like that then stop telling lies, stop fobbing off customers and start using thge money paid by the customers to give them a good experience. You know that way customers will not need to get irate at the draedfull service that PN supplies.

[#7]

A company I worked at manufactured machines which used Honda engines,

A few short years back Honda did their usual prediction of worldwide demand which suggested a substantial drop.

They reduced output accordingly.

Our company however, along with our competitors experienced a substantial increase in sales due to an upturn in the building industry.

I placed orders for a large quantity of engines which Honda said they were unable to fulfil until the following year.

We had already taken many orders based on our engine stock which was quickly exhausted.

We had irate customers on the phone asking where their machines were and were not interested in our problems with engine supplies.

It can be very difficult dealing with such customers when you know the fault is not yours.

[#8]

You are right again. But my wife as a manufacturing manager in an aerospace comapny and later an engine manufacturer always covered her back by looking for other supplikers and not being caught by one company hiking prices or going out of business.

But Plus have much of this in its own hands. In my case promising to check and initiatiate part of the contract and then simply not doing it and not checking on it has absolutely zilch to do with anything other than their own serious inefficiencies and very bad management.

To change the analogy, why is that when a football team does badly the manager is fired not the team who played the games?

But PN's business model has gone back to stack it high and don't worry if the service is absolutely appalling, we can always offer dressed up discounts and because of the appalling service still make profits. Win, win for everyone but the poor losers who pay them and actually, for some silly reason, expect that PN can deliver the service they have paid for.

[#9]

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@Mav wrote:

It takes a lot of patience in dealing with irate customers within any business and one of the most important aspects is actually listening to them.  

Yes.

I have never had any problem with Plusnet staff who always seem polite and helpful - In my case overwhelmingly via the forum.

Then again, with some of the forum 'helpers' - that's another matter! The advice to "listen" (and to realise that the customer, not you, knows the details of the problem and their local environment better than you do) is something that needs to be taken on board. As does an awareness that, although they are not staff, their attitudes and approach can still reflect badly on Plusnet the company.

IMO.

[#10]

Unfortunately listening to a customer does not solve their problem or issue. Infact it can make customers more irate, because being patted on the head and told they are sorry will just pour petrol on the flames when at the end of it they say, but we can't do anything about it for another month or perhaps never.

Listeniong also takes time and we spend far too long on the phones waiting already. Unless they hire buckets more staff and for a change train  them , so they are not just reading scripts, giving out wrong information or making promises that they never keep. I have examples from my own experience of all of those, I am sure that others can add by the million.

The writing is on the wall when long term, long suffering customers like Jelv leave.