Business & Finance Online Expert

Posts Tagged ‘customer service training’

All businesses strive to provide excellent customer service, but there’s a fine line between service and servility. Extreme servility is called obsequiousness. Now there’s a word for you to know. Even if you don’t know what it means, you’ve experienced it—maybe in a restaurant, a clothing store, a car dealership, anywhere where employees hope that by virtue of their attention they will make sales or garner large tips. It’s one thing to be attentive and meet customers’ needs; it’s another to be so present and “in their face” that customers think you want them to adopt you.

A few months ago, I ordered a gift of steaks and roasts from a meat mail order business for some family members. When no acknowledgement came, I called to find out if they had gotten their present. As it turned out, the parcel delivery service had left the package at the wrong address, but the people who had received it in error were honest enough to immediately call the intended recipients to let them know about the mix up.

The only person who had made a mistake was the delivery man who’d misread the mailing label, and no one ever heard a word out of him or his company. The same can’t be said for the meat company. In its relentless pursuit to keep customers satisfied, company representatives started calling me—daily—to make sure I was still happy and to see if I didn’t want to order more meat.

After the umpteenth call that resulted in no additional purchases from me, I asked to have my name and number removed from the calling list. Being nice hadn’t worked. Maybe some force would be more effective. Keep in mind I had had absolutely no beef with the mail order company until now. It was at this point, however, that customer service attention turned into customer obsession.