Are you listening? I feel prompted to share a thought or two. In the last two or three days I have had occasion to approach service providers who I pay to provide services to me. One of them being my local #Asda store in St Austell. What has prompted me to post is a question that has formed in my mind, particularly as I am suffering from the effects of a rather nasty fall in Asdas car park last night. It is do we listen differently to people when we are at work with all of the other demands that work places upon us that is going on in the backgrounds of our minds? My view is that having been in retail & customer service for over thirty years, it shouldnt necessarily be so. I like many others were taught the importance & value to the customer of being a very attentive good listener. However after the last two days, having to explain myself repeatedly & being left with the impression that I was somehow being awkward or that the listener only wanted to try & re-frame my explanation to suit their expectations of company policy I have started to wonder. Who is more important? The customer or the company? Last night whilst going back to my car i tripped & fell on the rather high kerb stones that surround the narrow pedestrian walkways which divide the road from the parking areas. The lighting isnt the best in the car park that it could be, but it is sufficient I suppose with large amounts of ambient back light from the store front. Quit simply the kerb stones as they are the same colour as the road and tarmac walkway and about 8 inches high could do with being painted white or yellow to mark the area clearly. I went sprawling and fell awkwardly twisting both wrists, left ankle & shoulder and damaging the goods I had just bought. Added to that I was rather shocked. I couldnt get up for a moment or two as I gathered my wits and realised I was in considerable pain. Two members of the public kindly came to my aid and helped me back to my feet and made sure that I was alright. I am very grateful for their kind help. At 57 years old Im beginning to think people look at me as being approaching senior years which I am , but which I dont think about LOL. I still think in twenty something in my head. One of the people who picked me up expressed the view that the pedestrian ways were poorly marked out & as the car park wasnt lit too brightly in those all important areas said he wasnt surprised and suggested the kerb stones should be painted to make them more visible.Its not until something like this happens to you that you think about things like that. I thanked them both very much & just wanted to get home. When I arrived home I decided to call Asda as I thought it could have been worse. It could have been a very elderly or infirm person this happened to with far more serious consequences. So I called, After waiting for an age on hold to get through, I got through to customer services, I explained myself to the service receptionist who understood perfectly well & said I will put you over to the service manager. To be fair, she did explain that there phone system does tend to cut people off & I know this to be true as It has happened many months ago when I enquired about stock & its a problem they still havent fixed! I did get cut off after being on hold for five minutes, so all in all ten minutes wasted. I called back & dialled the extension I was given & got put thorough to the duty manager & that is where it all started to go out the window LOL! I think im a pretty clear communicator with a good grasp of Queens English. I explained calmly & politely what had happened to me & he did apologise which I gratefully accept, however all he kept saying was he needed to understand what & how it happened & no matter how descriptive I was he just didnt seem to get it, nor did there seem to be any appreciation I was in pain & in a little shock. I t got to the point where I almost said shall I come back & give you an action replay so you can understand ! but I said, im sure if you have good security cameras and look at around the time it happened you will see for yourself to which he agreed. Obvious to me! ;-) I then said to him to try and keep things sweet that I have had thirty years in retail so I understand what It is like listen to customer complaints. Since he didnt mention he would need to put it in the accident book, I thought I should point that out. Yes he agreed, I will. He the proceeded to ask me for my personal details. At no time did he ask if my purchase was intact or if I had damage to clothes & personal possession I was advised if I felt worse to take myself to the hospital, which of course is logical. However I felt as if more customer care & sensitivity could have been shown. Im not looking for freebies or handouts, but i do want to be listened too with care and sensitivity if I have a problem as a customer & I would have thought that falling over & hurting ones self on the companies premises would have flagged itself up as a potentially serious issue. The first concern should be that of the customers safety and well being & the next should be why did it happen & is there anything we could do and should have done to minimise the potential risk. At 57, falling over flat on your face is not something I do every day. I beleive more training at management level in Asda may well be the order of the day in better appreciation of how to handle & react to delicate situations. Particularly when the staff at ground level seemed to have a complete grasp. All in In all Better listening & understanding skills of customer complaints please Asda, St Austell. I hope you do paint the kerb stones in the car park to make them high visibility so there are no more accidents. If I had fallen harder I could have fallen into the path of a moving vehicle & that did not even seem to have been appreciated. Thank you.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Mar 2014 09:41:20 +0000
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