Deaing with complaints

Many of us have to deal with complaints at one time or another, whether it is because the service we get is not up to scratch or whether we are on the receiving end of a complaint at work.  When we are at work we may find ourselves constrained by a sense that the organisation wants us to handle complaints in a certain way.  It’s true that effective organisations will have developed complaints policies and procedure to help complaints be dealt with well, but that doesn’t mean we have to forget the personal touch that is often at the essence of good complaints handling. We know this because we help organisations deal with complaints well.

Here are some ideas to help you handle those complaints well:

• Dealing with complaints is about people.  The human touch goes a long way to solving a complaint.  A complainant often wants understanding of their position.  This is often translated as “empathy” in corporate procedures and policies. So why not show you are taking the complaint seriously and recognise the emotion that is within the complaint?
• People need to know how to complain and what will happen to their complaint.  This is often described as “transparency”, “openness”, and “fairness”.  So you can see how these concepts get built into complaints policies. This means we should think about thanking people for raising their concerns because that means we can resolve them.
• Sorry is often the hardest word. It is okay to apologise. An apology, well meant, real and appropriate is often what the complainant will be seeking.  If you read the reports of the various complaints ombudsmen often a lack of a meaningful apology causes a complaint to run and run.
• Then there is the concept of redress.  That in corporate terms is simply “putting things right”. Often the complainant will fill their complaint with many issues to emphasise the importance to the complainant of what has gone wrong. This may be an attempt to get you to take notice of the issue.  Sometimes this is a detailed list of grievances and that can cloud the real issue.  Simply asking what will put things right can unlock a previously difficult complaint.
• Learning from complaints is usually another feature of a complaints handling policy.  That is because if we can stop it recurring then we will have happier customers but also because some complainants are motivated by trying to stop this situation happening to someone else.

So you can see why corporate complaints handling policies use formalised terms but that doesn’t mean your complaints handling has to be formal and stuffy. A real understanding of the customer’s concerns will often be the key to dealing with complaints.

If you need help with your complaints handling we offer a range of training and development solutions. We train people to deal with complaints across the UK, our experience spans over 20 years and so our help is just a phone call or email away.

Don’t rely of good luck. Instead rely on good complaints handling skills. Make sure you aretrained to deal with complaints effectively.

Alison Miles-JenkinsManaging DirectorTraining To Achieve (UK) Ltd