Last week I was alerted that there was a death in our family. It was a relative who lived in New York and they were extremely close to my mother, so I felt it pertinent to try to be there, and so starts my travel adventures and customer service mishaps.

Now to be clear, this post isn’t just to cover my going-on’s and travels, but I am using my experience to discuss the importance of customer service, as I strongly believe that with the day-to-day happenings, we often forget the importance of consumer relations.

When you talk to any executive, at any organization, regardless of vertical, they will tell you that they understand the importance of serving their customers, but way too often, the treatment of consumers differs from what you would expect from a ‘customer first’ organization. As we’ve stated on our blog in the past, our tightened economy and what some call a recession, has forced a new way of thinking from consumers. Their tolerance is lower and no longer will they be subject to substandard performance by a service they use, because the amount of choice in the market means they don’t have to.

Now before we continue on with this post and to ensure we are all on the same page, I think it important to breakdown what customer service is.  There are some basic customer service principles that if you, as an organization, get these  three principles right, you’ll be on the right track:

1. Listen
2. Exercise empathy
3. The customer must come first

I guarantee you that any other item you’ve been taught around customer service falls into the list of three above.

Let’s continue on with my story…

Knowing that I needed a flight to New York, I decided to start my search with my airline of choice, Porter Airlines. Unfortunately, given the short notice in booking, the rates were at least three and a half times more than what they normally would be, but because they are my airline of choice, I thought I would look to see if they had bereavement fares that would provide some relief on the price. At this point, I had come to terms with the fact that I may have to pay more. I called the Porter Air customer service line and explained my situation. Unfortunately, they were unable to help me, as they had no bereavement fares to offer, but what was worse was that the empathy was missing. The negative information about the flight would have been easier to take if the service rep showed some empathy. In the end I found a flight, using another airline and at a fraction of the price that Porter was offering me. I did share my feedback, in what I thought was a polite email to the Porter Air executives and the response wasn’t nearly pointed enough. They spoke about other things that they offered and none of which applied to my original query. So here, Porter Air appeared to not be listening.

Now my traveling woes don’t end with my flight booking, but they extend to my hotel stay at the W on Lexington in Manhattan. Now again, the W on Lexington is one of my favourite hotels, and I will try to stay there any time that I can, while in New York. I do this primarily because I like the décor and for the most part the service. Their “whatever whenever” mantra usually makes the customer feel that they are in charge. When I arrived at the W, around 7:00 pm, my room wasn’t ready (check in was at 3:00 pm) and they were fearing an overbooking situation. The check in attendant was good however, and assured me of a room in the next hour and in the meantime she offered to ‘comp’ a few meals and such. Although my room wasn’t going to be ready for at least an hour, I was ok with the level of empathy the attendant showed, with all that she had done. My issue with the W didn’t occur until the night before checkout when the manager of the hotel called me with a concerning comment, which led me to believe that they may have to charge my card for our room – - again. I went down to the lobby to chat with the manager, and had to wait for her to come out to the front. In the meantime, I talked to the representative at the counter and her response to me was “the manager is new. Don’t worry. There is nothing wrong. She is just new”. Before I could address the “she’s new” comment, the manager had arrived. As the manager and I chatted, her tone left a bit to be desired. All the while, I was thinking her newness is apparent not only in her actual tenure, but also in her approach. She had no understanding and didn’t take the time to check my file to see that I am a repeat customer and a good one at that. To make things worse, when I tried to confirm my bill upon check out, and of course asked to speak the same manager, she left me waiting at the counter and never appeared. So to the W I say, your leadership never listened, nor did they show empathy and most of all; no one thought of me, the customer. The manager’s newness should not cause a consumer to be displaced. With a customer first approach, I would expect the manager to perform the necessary research before making assumptions. What’s worse for the W is that I have a business trip in New York, scheduled for the very near future, and my stay at the W is pending, based on the expected reply I get from their leadership. (I will post the reply on my tumblr page).

As you can tell from my comments above, if you treat me well, I will be a return customer, even if that means I have to pay a bit more to do business with you. I am the kind of customer you want — Loyal. I can only assume that there are many more like me who are loyal, but still vocal when they feel that their service expectations have not been met by a long shot.  So to the W and to Porter Air, I repeat the three basic principles to customer service:

Listen – this ensures you delight the customer by providing a pointed solution

Apply Empathy – this ensures you still have a happy customer at the end of the call/interaction, even if your response is “no”

The Customer Must Come First – when you are about to do anything where a customer is concerned, think about how what you are about to do will affect them. If the roles were reversed, how would you react? Is your action only going to apply a short-term gain at the expense of a long-term loss?

A recent document (PDF)posted by Brandkeys, speaks to the Top Brand and Marketing Trends for 2010 and eight of the ten items listed all surround effective customer service. It’s an interesting read for all those in charge of consumer relations and and brand integrity.