You have every right to complain

about bad customer service.

And a huge obligation to compliment good customer service!

 

When our children were growing up, I used to tell them this often.  And much to their chagrin (or worse) I demonstrated what I meant.
  
It embarrassed them when I complained and they did not realize that few other people bothered to compliment good service.

Not infrequently, I would go into a restaurant kitchen, seeking a manager, so I could tell them about good service or good food.  Once, I even asked a server to bring the chef out to the table.  She agreed, not quite knowing why.  When he arrived, I told him my Grouper Escabeche was excellent and gave him a $10 tip for my $25 meal.  I figured the chef seldom gets to hear directly when his creation has excited a customer in a positive way, but they need to hear it.  (If a customer is unhappy, the chef may get it back in the kitchen for some sort of "rework.")  Later, the server confided that the chef was her boyfriend of some three years and he had never had that kind of compliment. [BTW .. I still go into kitchens.]

Over the years, my wife and I have sent letters to hotels and motels praising extraordinary service, sought out and thanked store managers for special help received from someone on the floor, and thanked people directly for their attentiveness or going beyond doing only "what is expected."  

More and more, we are becoming a service economy.  Even for us who make products, our service, more than any other thing, will set us apart from our competitors! 

 

-30-

Colonoscopy

I originally started this post while "recovering" from a colonoscopy earlier earlier that day.   If you have not had one and you are over 55 or 60, you should!  I had my first one six years ago and polyps were discovered and removed. Three years ago, another colonoscopy and more polyps.  Thus, I have just had another, with you guessed it, more polyps, which were removed.

These were flat polyps, "so come back in one year!"  Flat polyps are more difficult to detect and remove, so having a skilled, diligent, and experienced physician is especially important.  Flat polyps are more dangerous that other types, so they are tracked more closely. 

Entrepreneurs , lawyers and doctors all seem to have a level of belief about their invincibility and hence put off such screening tests as colonoscopies.  I have a friend, a lawyer, who does "not want anybody messing around with putting any chemicals into me which will affect my brain" and thus he will not consider a colonoscopy, even though he is over 65.

I once had a doctor tell me that he believed doctors had an "extremely high and unhealthy level of feeling of invincibility   ---  just like lawyers, and entrepreneurs, (including farmers)."

You have to believe strongly in yourself in lots of careers!!!!!!!!

But no matter what your level of self perceived invincibility,    

GET A COLONOSCOPY.

-30-

Customer Service at (insert your favorite store here)

My wife is hard to fit for clothing.  She is skinny.  Thus she has a hard time finding clothes that are small enough.

In our metro area we have two Buckle stores.  (They cater mostly to younger people who are more likely to be smaller, though they have a wide range of sizes) 

My wife usually goes to store "C" where they are always friendly and helpful.  A couple of days ago, she went to store "W" because she was in that area.  She told them the size jeans she was looking for.  Most of the staff was disinterested, but not busy.  One person said "we don't have that, but how would you like to try on" a larger size.  My wife said no, that would be too large.  So the salesperson tried again with the larger size idea, because "I know we have that size."  No one made an effort to look for the waist size my wife asked for.  Frustrated, to say the least, she left.

At store "C" she was greeted near the door by a salesperson who asked, (with enthusiasm) how she could be helped.  She told the person the size and style of jeans she needed.  The person (college aged) asked her name and then said to a couple of other staff members who were not busy "Karen is looking for waist size "X", can you help find some."  The store was abuzz with activity.  They found some and Karen bought them and passed out compliments to staff members in  the process. 

That is why she keeps going back to the Buckle in the College Square Mall.

She has talked before of their customer service and I have observed myself the level of attention and service at the College Square store.  We had assumed it was a corporate culture, but now I think it may be a local store manager more than a corporate culture.

-30-