Customer Service - An Exemplary Effort!

filthylucre.com

Last evening I was visiting my local shopping mall where I was going to pick-up this week's issue of Time Magazine, have some Chinese food and catch-up on what's happening in the world.  Arriving at the mall, I stopped at the bookstore and purchased my magazine. 

As always when I visit the Mall, I stopped at the Zales jewelry store to say hello to my son.  He's employed there and has been for a couple of years.  He was unusually happy to see me this evening as he needed a favor.  I figured he wanted me to pick-up a soda for him or something of that nature.  That was not the case.

He had a problem.  His problem was that the store's printer's ink cartridge was no longer serviceable.  He had a customer, actually a young couple, looking to purchase a wedding ring or band and needed to complete a finance sales agreement.  He told me that he would be unable to complete the sale without a signed agreement.  He asked me to drive to the local Office Depot store and purchase the ink cartridge. 

My son relayed to me that his call to the store manager was not well received.  The manager was unwilling to return to the store with an ink cartridge and told  my son to call someone, perhaps a friend, to purchase one and the store would do a paid out reimbursing the friend.  I turned out to be that friend.  I drove to the Office Depot store and purchased the appropriate ink cartridge and returned it to my son so that he could finalize the finance agreement with his customer.  He then reimbursed me for the cost of the ink cartridge.         

I was proud of my son this evening as he truly exemplified what going the extra mile for a customer is all about.  As a hotel executive, I love catching my employees performing in such a fashion and am incredibly gratified that my son understands the concept of taking care of the customer.  The young couple was most appreciative that I came to the rescue with the ink cartridge.  However, the real hero was my son who needed to solve a problem that his manager was unable or unwilling to accomplish. 

I know from my own hospitality experience that every customer is an important one.  I also know that my goal is to establish a relationship with that customer so that he becomes a life-long customer, not just a one-time customer.  I believe that my son accomplished that for Zales tonight when he bent over backwards, went that extra mile and developed a new relationship with this young couple.

Exemplary customer service is something we all run into from time to time.  Not nearly enough but we all have experienced it and know what it is when we receive it.  These are the experiences we go out of our way to share with our family and friends.  In a time when many employees and managers alike seem to care less, I experienced a child of mine displaying great passion for his work and a determination to take care of his customer.  I could not have been more proud of one of my own employees.  It was so much sweeter to experience it first-hand in my own son.  Great Job Daniel Hawkins Brown. 

Losing Faith In People - Thank God For My Children

anecdotalanna.wordpress.com

Calm, cool and collected.  The marketing phrase that was popular for years extolling the benefits of using Secret, the body deodorant, aptly describes my personality make-up.  I am the calm in the storm.  I am cool amid the stress.  I am collected among all the chaos.  Very little gets to me and my buttons are very difficult to find let alone push.  I would admit that my work in hospitality has frequently taken me closer to my meltdown point than I care to acknowledge.  Taking care of the customer becomes more challenging each year.     

This past weekend I experienced three different events that once again gave me great pause about the human condition.  I experienced anger, frustration and a feeling of hopelessness coming from all three of these experiences.  Each of them made my face grow red and my blood boil.  As calm, cool and collected as I am, my emotions were starting to get the best of me.    

The weekend started with a couple who reported that they had an IBM Tablet stolen from their room.  They immediately accused one of my housekeepers of stealing it.  Responding in a prudent and responsible fashion, I investigated the matter with haste along with my security counterparts.  The housekeeper was questioned and believed to be innocent.  Security reported back to the guest that our investigation found no theft on the part of the housekeeper.  The guests then made a point to search our 32-acre property to confront me and demand compensation. 

I was at our oceanfront restaurant having a light salad for lunch when the couple interrupted me with their loud, accusatory voices.  I explained to them that we were still investigating the matter but we believed the housekeeper was innocent.  They believed differently of course and made a point with their loud voices to make sure everyone else knew as well.  Later in the day, I returned to their unit to make a visual inspection myself under the guise that our insurance company would want to know that we did a search of the unit for the missing computer.

Finding nothing of course, I thanked them and indicated I would be calling the police to come by the following morning to complete a police report.  The husband showed up at the Front Desk the next morning and reported that they found their Tablet.  Funny how the couple just happened to find it prior to the police arriving.  Filing a false police report is a felony in South Carolina.  Funny how they chose not to search the property for either the housekeeper or I to apologize for their false accusations.

The second experience was a guest reporting to the Front Desk that their unit had bugs in it.  They had just arrived to their unit and found roaches all over the place.  I immediately went to the unit.  It was true.  There were roaches everywhere.  I acknowledged to the guest that the unit had a bug problem and made arrangements to have the guest moved to a different unit.  As I was walking out of the unit I noticed that there was a jar in the trash can by the kitchen.  This was a clean unit and there would have been no trash in the trash cans.  This guest, using the word loosely, emptied out the roaches into the room in hopes that they would receive a nicer and closer unit to the ocean. 

My third experience over the weekend and the one that still bothers me is seeing a three-year boy sitting on his mother's lap in the  passenger seat of their SUV.  They were driving on the property looking for a parking space.  There were two young girls in bathing suits walking toward one of our pools.  The little three-year old flips them the middle finger.  Mom is laughing watching her young son obviously emulate her or his father. 

Three wonderful experiences at the beach.  Every time I experience such behavior from my guests, I am reminded how proud and pleased I am with my three grown children, Timothy, Jennifer and Daniel.  I have truly been blessed with three wonderful children.   It is of great comfort to know that not one of my three would behave in just a boorish and ghastly fashion.  They restore my faith each and every day and help me overcome my frustration with disgusting and shameful people.