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Everyone makes mistakes. As customers, we get to be on the receiving end of those mistakes more often than we’d like – whether it’s the misplaced courier package, the car-repair estimate that came in far lower than the actual invoice, or the hotel reservation that mysteriously disappeared, things go wrong. It’s a fact of life.
What does this have to do with social housing? Well, you might not think of yourself as a service professional, but if you work with people you’re part of the service industry. They are your customers. And that means that you will make mistakes that affect others. That’s OK. Refer to paragraph one: “Everyone makes mistakes.” The trick is in knowing how to deal with them. That’s where service recovery comes in.
Service recovery is, quite simply, a set of actions that are taken to correct mistakes. Such actions can go a long way in improving the relationships you have with your residents, staff, contractors, board members….pretty much everyone!
Although every situation is unique, following these basic rules will help you to turn even the most unpleasant service experience around:
- The most important aspect of service recovery is to acknowledge your mistake. Apologize. This seems so simple, yet it’s one of the most difficult aspects of customer service to master. Why? Most of us are loath to apologize for something we didn’t actually do. Why say sorry because the elevator is broken? You didn’t break it!Well, no – perhaps you did not actually break the elevator, but you can apologize for the inconvenience.
- Don’t make excuses or blame someone else. The absolute worst thing you can do is to try to deflect responsibility to someone, or something, else.Let’s say you promised a resident that the community room would be available for him or her to have a get-together. Unfortunately you forgot that you’d previously booked the room for an outside group’s committee meeting. It’s Wednesday at 7:00 and both groups are having a stand-off in the hallway.Your first reaction might be to point a finger at someone else or, even worse, at one of them. Don’t! At the moment you have a potentially volatile situation, and an opportunity to repair some damage.
- Offer an alternative solution. Depending on the situation, you might be able to substitute a product or service for what was offered. Be accountable for what happened.OK, so maybe there aren’t a lot of alternatives when the elevator is down. But you could offer to store a tenant’s perishables in your fridge rather than make them carry all of their groceries up the stairs. Or perhaps you turn the situation into a community event, where neighbours help neighbours until the elevator is repaired. The point is to be creative.How about the situation with the community room? Well, maybe there is another space available for one of the groups to meet. Or the committee meeting might only take a half-hour, leaving time for the other group to get together after. You may not be able to come up with an ideal solution, but anything is better than leaving the 2 groups yelling at each other, and at you.
Here are a few more things to keep in mind:
- Ask questions. Often, when confronted with a less-than-ideal situation, our first response is to “satisfy” the customer and move on. Unfortunately we forget to find out what the client needs, and instead offer what we think will make them happy. Bad move. Making assumptions is probably what got us into trouble in the first place.
- Empathise. Let your customer know that you would feel the same way in his or her shoes.
- Don’t take it personally! Taking pride in your product or service is a good thing – arrogance is not.
And if all else fails, breathe deeply. Ultimately the effort is worth the reward.
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