Satisfied Customers Are Our Voluntary Brand Advocates
GZ: Genesis Zinnas, you work in the Customer Services Unit, what was the unit set up to achieve?
GZ: We receive enquiries and complaints from the customers on a daily basis and try to proffer solutions within a stipulated time. Another thing this unit does is to get feedback; feedback is very important to enable us fine-tune areas of our operations that need to be improved upon, we also enlighten and educate our customers. If you look at the meter installation exercise, you will notice that there is a lot of knowledge gap; therefore we have taken it upon ourselves to educate them on how to use the meter instead of refereeing them to the Metering Department.
CCD: From the much you have done as a Unit, how long will it take for the impact to be felt in the company?
GZ: There is a saying that goes thus: a customer can forget what you said about them but cannot forget how you make them feel. Therefore, it goes without saying that we are the ones that delight our customers in such a way that they are encouraged to pay their bills. As the saying goes: a happy customer is a paying customer.
We cannot comprise on customer satisfaction even though we somewhat operate in a monopolistic market. They are the reason why we are in business. So, what we do here is to ensure that we make them happy customers. They will in turn be voluntary brand advocates and sometimes whistleblowers in areas where cases of meter bye-pass are prevalent, or if there is any act capable of undermining our services; though we have a monitoring team but we can’t be there everywhere at every time.
All these have impacted on our bottom line positively.
CCD: The job of a Customer Service Person seems synonymous with complaint resolution. How do you resolve these complaints?
GZ: In dealing with customers or as a Customer Care Personnel you have some level of emotional intelligence because you meet customers from different background, culture, religion etc. And of course you must put yourself in the customer’s shoe; that is what we mean by empathy. When an angry customer walks in to lay a complaint, you must understand that he/she is not angry with you rather angry about the services of your organization. That is why a Customer Care person has to be a good listener in order to resolve complaints from a customer no matter how irate he/she is. As we say here (Customer Care Unit), there is a difference between hearing and listening; we listen to understand.
CCD: Teamwork is one of our core values; do you consider yourself a team player?
GZ: In an organization such as this, being a team player is imperative to the success of the company because it means that all departments working together to achieve the organization’s set objective. It is only a team player that will appreciate a company’s vision or where it is headed.
Take the recent decline in the company’s revenue for instance, which has resulted in a renewed call for revenue mobilization drive and how we are going to improve our collection. Most people see it as Sales Person’s job, but it is actually a collective responsibility.
CCD: What is the difficult part of being a Customer Care Representative?
GZ: I would say insufficient Customer Data because most times we have complaints from customers and when we check our system we don’t get complete information on the customer; vital information like house address, email address, or phone numbers. How then do you fulfill your “Know Your Customer” (KYC) when you don’t have all this information?
This has been a major hindrance to doing our job. There is also a knowledge gap on the part of some of our customers; some of them do not know that the company is now privately run.
CCD: The July collection arguably is the lowest we have received so far. Can you comment on this?
GZ: The revenue collection should be of concern to all staff because it appears to be a case of “We versus Them”; rather it should be a problem for all. The company’s problem should be our concern. I feel there are things we can do to improve the revenue collection like cost control.
Look at the new meters that have just been installed for instance; we are supposed to generate revenue because we have installed a measuring device but on the contrary, there were cases of looping resulting in loss of revenue and meter damage.
We should intensify efforts to ensure that our alternative modes of payment like POS, ATM and Internet Banking are available to boost collection.
CCD: Do you have any suggestions on how we can improve relationship with our customers?
GZ: Yes, there are many ways we can improve our relationship with customers. Firstly, the Customer Care Officer should be equipped with soft skills, being respectful, friendly without being over familiar. Customer profiling based on age, class, culture and many more, sending text messages or emails as a reminder for example: “Sir our record shows that you did not settle your last bill, kindly go to our nearest office”, sending bulk SMS on holidays, road shows to create awareness; all these can improve our relationship with them.
CCD: What advice would you like to give to Management?
GZ: The appeal I have for management is that, they should be open to innovation/ suggestion from staff. Also, there should be a uniform standard in all the offices company wide such that when customers visit they get the same feel.
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