How To Handle Customer Complaints

ACCOR HOTELS - IBIS

AIM AND OBJECTIVES

The Aim of the Presentation is to Learn, or Refresh memories about the best way to Deal with Customer Complaints

The Objectives are:

State the Business Impact of NOT handling complaints correctly

State what causes people to complain

Explain how Effective Communication can be used to handle complaints State a strategy for Handling Complaints

         

    

       

       

WHAT COULD BE THE FINAL COST IMPLICATION TO THE BUSINESS OF NOT RESOLVING A CUSTOMER COMPLAINT?

Look at the following 3 questions – take 5 minutes to consider and write down your answers

1. What would be the Immediate Loss of Business to your hotel?

2. What could be the potential Loss of Business once that customer has left the hotel?

3. What could be the knock on effect and potential Loss of Business?

LOSS OF BUSINESS (CONT)

ANSWERS

1. Money – overnight accommodation / breakfast / bar / dinner – add up the possibility of what you could lose to see exactly what the amount is in £’s

Reputation – both with complaining customers & those that overhear

Confidence – for dealing with future cases

Head Office Complaint

2. Regular guest – add up how much they spend over a year

Who they tell back at the office / is the company a regular user

3. Once they leave the hotel who would they then discuss the complaint with at least 84 people

Reputation of Accor not just Ibis

Loss of bonus

SO, WHY DO PEOPLE COMPLAIN?

Think of a time when you felt you had to complain about something, ie in a shop, on holiday, etc. What drove you to complain at that time – how did you feel?

• Frightened• Emotional• Embarrassed• Irrational• Disappointment• Expectations not met• Helplessness• Frustration / Anger / Agression• No-one willing to listen

WHY DO PEOPLE COMPLAIN?(cont)

So, if you were at the receiving end of this behaviour – how would you feel?

• Angry Yourself / You try to shout them down• You get the temptation to start to justify• Get aggressive yourself• You want to run away and hide• You are tempted to pass the buck / blame someone else• You feel intimated• You get very defensive• You switch off and don’t listen• You are unwilling to serve any further

WHY DO PEOPLE COMPLAIN?(cont)

So, looking at how you might react – if we did portray these feelings, how might this affect our complaining Customer?

• They will just become more difficult

• They will probably complain higher up (Head Office)

• The Customers problem will NOT get solved

• They decide they no longer wish to be our Customers

• They will certainly tell other potential customers about our bad service

WHY DO PEOPLE COMPLAIN?(cont)

So, ideally – How should we react to our Complaining Customers?

• Remain Calm and confident• Ask the Customers Questions• Listen to the Customer• Don’t try to justify the situation• Ignore rudeness • Take command of the situation and stay there• Let them know you care about their complaint• Be polite and professional• Let them talk• Understand the problem

So, taking all these feelings into consideration – there are areas that we can look at to control and help overcome these feelings

One of the key areas to Handling Complaints well is:

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION

There are 3 areas of Effective Communication to look at when dealing with Complaints:

1. BODY LANGUAGE

2. LISTENING SKILLS

3. QUESTIONNING TECHNIQUES

BODY LANGUAGE

When dealing with Complaints it is important to consider the following Body Language:You can try the exercise below before carrying on if there is more than 1 delegate:

Posture & Distance: Do you stand upright or slouched? Are you too near or too far from the other person? Are you higher or lower?

Eyes: Is your gaze relaxed or friendly? Do you maintain eye contact or look away?

Mouth: Do you hold your jaw tightly? Is your smile appropriate or misleading?

Voice: Watch the tone and volume. Notice if you whine or shout or whisper. Are you sarcastic through the tone of your voice?

Content: Are you mumbling or speaking clearly? Do you swallow your words or come across clear and with confidence?

Appearance: What does your appearance say about the impression you want to give other people?

Breathing: Before you try and assert yourself, deepen your breathing and calm yourself. Learning how to relax your body reduces your anxiety and helps you feel confident, even in difficult situations.

Gestures: Watch for hands over the mouth, or clutching at hair or jewellery or clasped behind your back. Are your arms folded? Are your feet shifting from one to the other?

Body Language (cont)

LISTENING SKILLS

ExerciseSometimes, we get caught up with details and do not listen

to the whole conversationWe allow our minds to wanderWe are also concerned with not having an answer for the last

question that we forget to concentrate on the next one:

Listen to the following questions and write down the answers:

1. How many animals did Moses take into the Ark?2. The doors of a house all face south, a bear comes past a window.

What colour is the bear?3. A man picks up a coin dated 40 BC. How is this possible?4. A rabbit is lying dead in the centre of a field. The field is forty feet

square. How many hops does it take him to get to the edge?5. You are driving a bus down Fleming St when it collides with a car

coming out of a drive. The age of the car driver is 22 years and his passenger is 10. Two passer-bys stop to help and their ages are 45 and 50. The passengers on the bus get off to see what its all about and their combined age is 130 years. The police arrive. The two officers are aged 29 and 30. How old is the driver?

LISTENING SKILLS (cont)

ANSWERS:

1. None. Moses did not have an ark – it was Noah

2. White. The house is right on the North Pole

3. It isn’t. They didn’t know about Christ’s birth 40 years before he was born

4. None at all!! The rabbit is dead in the centre of the field

5. Your own age……. The narrative starts off “You are driving….

So, how well did you LISTEN?

EFFECTIVE LISTENING CONCLUSION

So in order to ensure you are Listening Effectively, you must remember the following points:

1. Find an area of interest in what is being said. If you are interested you are more likely to understand the objective of what is being said to you

2. Listen analytically – look for central themes, link necessary details, etc

3. Judge the content of the complaint, not the person relaying it. Don’t assume that you know what they are going to say

4. Seek clarification where necessary – help the speaker to help you understand

5. Eliminate distractions if possible and concentrate on the speaker

6. Give yourself enough time to listen – be ready to respond but not too hastily

7. Listen to the feelings behind what the speaker is saying. Be sensitive to what the speaker is communicating non-verbally

8. Maintain good eye contact with the speaker – attention involves the whole body and show interest by sitting and looking at the other person

9. Try to suspend judgement initially – listen in a non-evaluative way. Only evaluate when you have thoroughly understood

Remember, you are in control of how well you Listen. Research shows that the more you fear the consequences of not listening to someone, the more you will listen. Therefore there is no reason why you can not listen to anyone 100%

QUESTIONING TECHNIQUES

EXERCISE:

The tutor is to think of a famous person, ie, David Beckham, Madonna, Prince Charles, Kylie Minogue

You must then brief the member of staff to try and guess who you are but the only answer you can give is YES or NO

The delegate then must try to find out who the famous person is

After a few minutes if the delegate is still struggling you must allow them to ask any question at all

Question why we did this…. This leads into types of questions you could ask – have a guess?

QUESTIONING TECHNIQUES

There are 5 types of questions that you could ask in order to check understanding of the conversation:

1. Open : Questions that give you information.

Start your question with Who / What / Where / When / Why & How.

2. Closed : Questions that only give you a YES or

NO answer. If you only ask closed questions you will not get a great deal of information. They can be useful though, to clarify a point or bring a long conversation to an end.

3. Probing : Asking about a subject in more depth.

Listening to what is said and probing into the detail can get a clear picture of the issue

4. Leading :

Can be dangerous to use as they lead the person to answering to the response that you want to hear and do not give them an opportunity to express the real issue

4. Multiple :

Putting more than one question in a sentence can mean that neither of them gets answered, or the person only answers the one they want to hear. This doesn’t help you to clarify the situation

So, How to Handle Complaints Correctly?

By using the L. E. A. R N. module

L….ISTEN• Establish and maintain eye contact• Use positive body language (nod your head / smile appropriately)• Let them finish – don’t interrupt and jump to conclusions

E….MPATHISE• Thank them for bringing the problem to your attention• Restate the problem, being sure to include how the guest felt about it

A….POLOGISE• Apologise without making excuses• Maintain eye contact with the guest• Take responsibility – speak on behalf of the entire team – use ‘we’ not ‘they’

R….EACT• Take care of the guest’s immediate need – resolve the problem now

N….OTIFY• Someone to make sure that the problem does not occur again Be sure to log the problem for tracking purposes

SMILE

THE GUEST HEARS…….

WE CARE!!!!

This leads us into 15 minute satisfaction guarantee