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Customer Service and Compliant handling

Introduction
It is to be noted that the Ministry of Revenue has embarked reforms in all its sectors of activities. The reforms are geared to an enhancement of its capacity to service delivery, modernize management and operations throughout the organization. This article deals with customer service and complaint handling. It may provide bird's eye view insight about why and how people complain, quality of an effective complaint handling system, techniques and methods of investigating complaint. It is also mentions an effective complaint handling system and components. We hope you would benefit further knowledge regarding customer service and complaint handling.

Background

Civil servants need to satisfy the people’s demand like wise business personals meet their customers; and this is practical if at all possible the customer needs are appropriately& timely addressed. Divergence of meeting customer expectation is result in complaints. In social and business marketing notion customer complaint handling is a key instrument of identifying the problem in the course of service providing and apt response to complaints. The most important tasks in the customer service are designing and implementation of customer’s compliant handling system and identify problems that may have been encountered and propose solutions to those problems. . It is agreed that customers who make complaints now and then should be considered as loyal to the organization rather than the sources of havoc. Hence an organization should pay due attention of these parties and implement systematic compliant handling mechanism. The cost of compliant analysis and handling must justify the benefits of handling complaints.

Objectives

The Objectives of effective compliant handling are:

· Meeting customer satisfaction.

· Building trust and confidence.

· Avoiding unfavorable publicity.

· Providing fair, transparent and timely service.

· Avoiding legal costs.

· Ease burden in the day-to-day work of legal system.

· Informing management.

Why people complain?

· The reason why people complain is essentially, when their needs are not properly addressed and dissatisfied with the service that they received.

How people Complain?

· Complaints are usually addressed to other than the subject of grumble. e.g. Third parties .

· Informal complaints are expressed in idiomatic or in proverbs used in different culture, moaners are never like to put complaints in writing. There fore organizations pave condition and encourage complainer to complain as soon as they feel some thing wrong.

Desire of Complainer/ appellant

· Recognition that they have a legitimate right to express their feeling.

· An apology and/ or redress.

· Clear explanation of what went wrong and why.

· An assurance that wrong doing will be corrected and not repeated again.

Quality of an effective compliant handling system

· Accessibility and well advertised.

It is proved that most customers want to complain if they know that there will be quick response to complaints and the compliant handling system is accessible. If an organization wants a compliant handling system that works, then it has to make the compliant handling system easy for the customer to use it.

Thus: -

Customer service and compliant handling office should be available for all working days and hours.
Have forms, suggestion boxes, office or expert to register complaints.
Customer service and complaint handling office should be located where services are rendering.
The procedures are well advertised through posters and notices.

· Simple and easy to understand.

Avoid complex and bureaucratic complaint handling system.

· Implement speedy complaint handling system and established well defined time limits for investigation and action, Because the longer a complaint runs on the more annoying customers become

· Ensure a full and fair investigation.

An effective complaint handling system is the right arm of the management. Therefore,

The management should not allow complaint handling officer to judge an evidence without full, fair and proper investigation.

· Respect people's desire and confidentiality.

Pursued customer that there will be no adverse consequences or they will not be singled out as troublemakers because of complaining.

· Address all the problems and provide an effective response and appropriate redress. The response should be:-

Apologizing to any mistakes committed.
Assuring the same mistake or mistreatments will not happen again.
Written response for written complaints.
Making visible changes of front line staff and other service providers.
Compensate / redressing the customer.

· Provide information to management that service can be improved. This could be done by: -

Circulating finding to different departments and the management.
Integrating all the complaints of customers in to quarterly or annual report.
Reporting the investigation result with associated recommendation to the management.

Some practical considerations of complaint handling

· Train staff (including managers) .

· Empower the front-line staff to resolve complaints themselves whenever possible.

· Accept as dogma the customer is as always right even wrong.

· Make realistic estimate of how many complaints it might expect to handle.

· Record customer satisfaction with the way complaints is handled.

· Be positive.

Techniques of Complaints handling

· Handling complaints face-to face.