The Indian Optician, January-February, 2010 Issue

(contd. from the last issue Part I) ….. There was another chemist near our new residence. A much better laid out shop ….. much better stocked with a much wider range of products. This seemed like a great alternative !! We also became members of the ‘frequent buyer’ group and got a ‘loyalty’ card that allowed us accumulation of points which could be redeemed on subsequent purchases. They announced ‘24X7 service’ and ‘free home delivery’ on signages in and outside the shop, on the loyalty card, invoice copies, carry bags et al. This was ‘The Promised Land’, I thought to myself, very happy with my decision to have tied up with them !!

I started visiting the shop, shifting our required chemist related purchases there. One day, due to some pressing engagements, I decided to order for home delivery on the phone. After what seemed like eternity, my call was answered by a voice at the other end, telling me to hold on and that they would take my order in a short while. This was even before I could lose my cool and ask the voice at the other end, why it took them so long to pick up the phone. So I held on to my end of the line ….. 

To share how I felt then and how things shaped up subsequently, let me request you to hold on to your end of the line till the next issue and to try to figure out my feelings at that moment. Needless to say, you may curse me for my arrogant sounding closure to this article ….. and I must say that that is quite close to how I felt on being told to hold on to my end of the telephone line by ‘The Land of Promises’. 

Part II

Sure enough, the feeling was of anger, helplessness, despair. Many of you wrote back to me saying that you have been through similar situations and understand and empathise with me. Some even wrote saying that you were waiting for the continuation and wanted to see what happened next. Not that what I shared was something new or had great insight, but I guess it did strike a chord with some of you. We all are aware of the several ‘Dos and Don’ts’ of Customer Service. The idea here is not to ‘list’ down the same and preach in a didactic manner. No, not at all. Infact that is quite easy and simple. There are several ‘Commandment type texts’ on this topic. But that is not the objective really. That is, I don’t want to be and sound like a preacher. I just thought that through this medium, I could share some of the situations that I went through, some examples of good and bad customer service from our daily lives. Hence, the format is more ‘experience sharing and conversational’. I hope in the subsequent issues I am able to share more such ‘live’ cases with you. So let me continue from where I left in the last issue …..

I kept holding the line, waiting for someone to get back to me. No one did. The line got disconnected on its own after some time. I dialled once more. Again, after many rings, the call was answered. Some improvement this time though. The voice at the other end said politely ‘Good Evening !! XYZ Pharmacy, how can I help you ?’.

‘I want to place an order for home delivery ?’ I said. I was told that the person who takes orders was not at the counter and I should call again after some time !! I put the phone down and counted 10 (I was told by someone, that that is the best way to calm one’s nerves). The sequence of dialling and holding the line and listening to the recorded message (this was something to the effect that my call was very important to them) at the other end continued. Finally someone came on the line and I repeated my request for placing an order. ‘Sir, we do not have delivery boys right now. Your order cannot be delivered today. Can we deliver tomorrow morning by 11.30 AM ?’ the voice suggested. ‘But you promise home delivery and 24X7 service’.

‘Sir the delivery boys leave at 6.00 PM. It is already 5.30 PM. We cannot deliver your order today.’

‘Do you realise it is a medicine order. How can it wait till tomorrow ? The first dose has to be taken now.’

‘Sorry Sir, we cannot deliver it now. There is no one to deliver’.

‘But I am a loyalty card holder, you talk of 24X7 service, you promise home delivery. How can a big name like yours not live up to its commitments ?’

‘Sorry Sir, there is no one to deliver right now.’

‘But …..’ I started and stopped, realising that this was not going to go anywhere.

Why ? Why at all would anyone use Big Slogans and Lofty Promises if they do not wish to live by them, I wondered. The only reason I could think of is to mislead customers to walk in, even if it meant creating a false perception of what they stand for. But this is so short lived. The customer will walk in once, but if the ‘seller’ doesn’t ‘Walk The Talk’, repeat visits will not take place. Not only that, it spreads a negative word of mouth. Positives travel much less than negatives. In so many of my interactions with people, whenever there have been discussions related to customer service levels, always, descriptions of negative experiences have come first and have been more numerous than those of positive experiences. In a highly competitive environment, where positive referrals depend so much on service levels, they are also more difficult to elicit. The task becomes even tougher then !!

My mother had a knee problem last year and had great difficulty walking. The doctor advised knee braces of a certain type. I went to the same pharmacy again, sticking to the same store, thanks to the loyalty card and also because, as I had mentioned earlier, the store was well stocked with a wide range of product offerings. It was the first time that I realised how many variants are there in knee braces as well. One would have thought that it is a simple contraption, something that one pulls up upto the knees. They did not have the recommended ‘size’ in stock though. However, the counter person was kind enough to check with their central warehouse and promised to arrange for it after ‘two’ days. I called after two days to check if it was there. No luck. Another day and then yet another passed and I finally picked it up after 5 days.

To our surprise, the brace would not slide up to her knee level. Fortunately, the pack did not have a sealed wrap and she had tried only one brace, which also did not move beyond the calf area. I promptly packed it again and rushed back requesting for an exchange of size. Maybe I was removed from reality and had misplaced expectations. ‘No Sir, we cannot exchange it please’, was the straight answer from the same counter boy who had so ‘kindly’ arranged for the size in the first place. The pair had cost Rs.4000/- !! No amount of reasoning helped.

Stuck that I was, with no other option and the fact that I had to get the correct size for my mother, I went to another shop. ‘Sir, try this other brand ….. same quality, same design, same purpose and better price too’, the counter person said. I told him that I would buy it, but asked if I could I take it home, get my mother to try it and if at all it was required, exchange for a different size ? ‘No problem Sir, if it does not fit, take another size’, he smiled and said. I took it home and my mother tried the new pair of braces. The size was perfect, the fit was extremely comfortable. I never used the ‘loyalty card’ from the previous shop again ….. I never needed to.

More …..

J.P.Singh

The Indian Optician, November-December, 2009 Issue

I think of myself as quite a calm person, who gets along well with most people. My relationships have been generally warm and cordial. I try to stick to my commitments and believe very strongly in truth, ethical behaviour and integrity. Whenever I have sensed people deviating from these values, I have just casually kept distance and walked away from them, rarely losing my cool and creating a raucous.

However, there have been times when my wife and children have had to intervene to get me to keep my temper down and to calm me. These situations, generally, are related to levels of customer service that I find against the values I described above or are straight irritating and unacceptable to me. My sensitivity to such situations, quite possibly, could also be due to heightened awareness due to my involvement in ‘Customer Value Creation’. So maybe I am unreasonable in my assessment to some extent. But I do believe, that to varying degrees, most people would empathise with me.

Also, not to say that there have not been experiences of pure delight in customer service, where I have reciprocated through my continued patronage and loyalty, shifting more and more of my purchases to the shop, preferring to buy from there even if it was not the core offering, but the owner still stocked them as peripheral items.

A case in point is the neighbourhood chemist shop owner in the locality where we used to stay earlier. Every visit to the shop (and remember that a visit to a chemist shop may not always be without a certain level of anxiety) was accompanied by a pleasant greeting. Even if there was stress due to an illness in the family, not that the stress would go, but the smiling acknowledgement of one’s arrival did not definitely aggravate the situation. He would ask about the well being of family members, occasionally check how work was going or discuss current happenings, depending on circumstances. Over a period of time, familiarity and comfort level increased and I found myself shifting our monthly purchases of toiletries also to this shop, since he stocked them too. If anything was out of stock at that time, he would promise to organise delivery and always stuck to his commitments. We rewarded him generously with loyalty and by increasing the basket of what we bought from him, adding toothpastes and soaps and deodorants to our list of medicines to be purchased ….. Prices were never discussed !!

We then shifted to another locality. Due to distance, obviously we could not continue to patronise this chemist shop. But still, whenever in that area, we would stop by to pick up certain things we remembered or just to say hello.

There was another chemist near our new residence. A much better laid out shop ….. much better stocked with a much wider range of products. This seemed like a great alternative !! We also became members of the ‘frequent buyer’ group and got a ‘loyalty’ card that allowed us accumulation of points which could be redeemed on subsequent purchases. They announced ‘24X7 service’ and ‘free home delivery’ on signages in and outside the shop, on the loyalty card, invoice copies, carry bags et al. This was ‘The Promised Land’, I thought to myself, very happy with my decision to have tied up with them !!

I started visiting the shop, shifting our required chemist related purchases there. One day, due to some pressing engagements, I decided to order for home delivery on the phone. After what seemed like eternity, my call was answered by a voice at the other end, telling me to hold on and that they would take my order in a short while. This was even before I could lose my cool and ask the voice at the other end, why it took them so long to pick up the phone. So I held on to my end of the line …..

To share how I felt then and how things shaped up subsequently, let me request you to hold on to your end of the line till the next issue and to try to figure out my feelings at that moment. Needless to say, you may curse me for my arrogant sounding to closure to this article ….. and I must say that that is quite close to how I felt on being told to hold on to my end of the telephone line by ‘The Land of Promises’.

To be continued …..

J.P.Singh