Customer Service

I used to work at Lee’s Marketplace in Smithfield, Utah. There was always one topic that would come up during our training meetings: customer service. When customers came to the grocery store I was supposed to greet them using the 10-4 rule. This rule meant I had to greet a customer if they were within ten feet of me, and I had four seconds to do it. Another rule was to ask customers if they needed help finding anything. I memorized where to find every last item in that store so I could help shoppers find what they needed. Also, we were told to resolve conflicts peacefully. For example, if a customer had a price disagreement we were to call for a price check from a manager. Basically, my training in customer service meant that I needed to be courteous and kind and keep to the rule “the customer is always right.”

I did my best to use these rules of customer service. However, sometimes I thought these rules were ridiculous because I thought it was tedious and unnecessary to talk to everyone. I only began to appreciate the customer service at Lee’s after I saw the customer service at other stores. For example, I was shopping at Wal-Mart and I asked a worker where to find cream of tartar (I was making cookies). He didn’t know where to find it so he asked three other coworkers. None of them knew where to find it! I finally found the cream of tartar after hunting through several aisles. I felt so un-helped by the Wal-Mart employees. I also felt ignored because I walked by several workers who never greeted me or asked if I needed help finding anything (apparently they couldn’t help me anyway).

Another example of bad customer service is when my sister and I shopped at K-Mart. My sister bought a Halloween costume that was clearly marked 50 percent off. When we got to the checkout, the cashier rang the costume in at the full price of $20. My sister and I told the cashier it was marked down 50 percent to $10 dollars. The cashier was rude and accused us of reading the sign wrong. My sister paid the full price of $20, but we went back and asked a manager if the costume really was $20 dollars. The manager said the 50 percent off sign was correct but it wasn’t in the computer system. So my sister got $10 back and our rude cashier got in trouble.

I really admire good customer service after having these experiences. As a message to my peers at USU that are going into business I just want to say that good customer service is a great skill to learn. I believe that having good customer service skills helps promote a positive image of a business. A business can succeed by having customers who come back after having positive experiences with customer service. However, if customers have negative experiences they may never come back and the business will fail. “When customer service is handled without any effort to establish a relationship or connection, it often leads to stressful interactions and frustration on both ends. You can build greater customer loyalty by exhibiting compassion and making the person feel as if he or she has been listened to and understood” (Gullickson).

Gullickson, Betsy Raskin. “The Start of a Beautiful Friendship.” Strategic Finance. June 2009. Pg. 8