Call centres that drive away custom

If they don't address a customer's needs they risk losing that business for good

Ring ring. An automated voice prompts me to make a selection. Then a warning about the call being recorded, followed by elevator music, sounding distorted.

Five minutes later: "Good day, can I help you?"

You can indeed. Here's my problem.

"You're in the wrong section. I'll transfer you."

More elevator music. Another five minutes. "Good day, can I help you?"

I repeat my problem.

"I'll have to check. Hold on."

More elevator music. Then I'm cut off.

Ring ring. Automated voice. More elevator music.

New call agent. I repeat my problem.

"Nobody in technical is available right now. We'll call you back."

I want a name. No response, so I ask again. "It's Jane."

Two days pass. No call.

Ring ring. Automated voice. More distorted music.

Is Jane there?

"Jane? I don't know any Jane. I'm John. How can I help?"

I repeat the problem, for the fourth time.

"Sorry, we don't handle such queries. Our subsidiary ABC does."

''You're joking, right? If true, why didn't the morons I spoke to days ago tell me this?''

"I can't answer that, ma'am. And I don't like your tone ..."

Sound familiar? There are few among us who haven't been subjected to inept call centre and help desk staff. South Africa has close on 1900 call centres, staffed by 175000 agents.

I recently called a customer care line to ask about a product I couldn't find. It had been discontinued, the agent told me. Why or when she couldn't say. She made no offer to find out or pass on to management the fact that a customer was very disappointed. Doesn't business realise that some of its best market intelligence is gathered by listening to what customers tell call agents?

The latest statistics from Dimension Data's Global Contact Centre Benchmarking Report for 2011, which includes South Africa, are dismal. Answering speeds, response quality and resolution rates have all deteriorated since 2009.

The 2008 report is even worse. In comparing performance between 1998 and 2008, the average percentageof calls abandoned by frustrated customers had doubled. The average time taken to respond to a customer's voice mail message was up from 11 hours to 20.

Independent call centre consultant Rod Jones put it down to inadequate and inappropriate staffing, training, infrastructure and technologies.

"Entry-level call centre agents in some operations can earn between R3000 and R4500 a month," said Jones. "That's less than retail store clerks earn over the Christmas period.

"The state of call centres in South Africa, and in particular the 'wild west' of unsolicited telemarketing, is an appalling mess.

"I am on a bit of a mission to help clean up the industry," said Jones, who sits on the contact centre standards technical committee of the South African Bureau of Standards.

In 2008, South Africa was the first country in the world to gazette standards for call centres. Not that it's helped much.

Jones, who chairs the Independent Contact Centre Consultants Association and the Direct Marketing Association of SA Teleservices Council, wants to see businesses put as much money into call centres and customer service as they do into marketing.

"It costs eight to 10 times as much to win a new customer as to retain a loyal customer," he said.

Extensive regional research by Cape Town customer service consultancy N'Lighten reveals that 70% of the reason customers abandon a company has nothing to do with the product; the main reason for switching is poor service.

A staggering 96% will not tell a business they're unhappy, meaning that for every one customer who complains, more than 20 remain silent. But more than 90% of unhappy customers won't buy from that business again.

The good news is that 70% of complaining customers will do business with a company again if a complaint is resolved in their favour.

Jones champions an article published in Harvard Business Review in 2010, "Stop Trying to Delight your Customers", in which the authors argue against the conventional wisdom that companies should delight their customers by exceeding service expectations.

Their large-scale study into contact centres, including in South Africa, revealed that what customers really wanted, and seldom got, was a satisfactory solution to their problem.

Reducing customer effort, stopping the need for follow-up calls, learning from disgruntled customers, and focusing on problem-solving, not speed, were the way forward, the researchers said.

Said Jones: "It says forget the bells and whistles if you want to win loyalty; just reduce the customer's effort and solve the problem.

"Well-defined customer service strategies, methods and processes are well documented and today's service support technologies are effective and efficient.

"There are no longer acceptable excuses for poor service delivery from contact centres."

I hope business is listening.

Sunday Smile

At Revlon - again - for finding some of reader Corinne Munro's favourite, but discontinued, perfume in its staff shop and then sending it to her free of charge. "That's service for you," says Munro. Why can't all customer care be like this?

Sunday Snarl

At Early Bird Services and Mastercare for appalling customer care. Telephones either go unanswered, remain engaged for weeks, or boast an automated message telling you to call back later. My advice to those with maintenance contracts: cancel them.