Complaining and apologizing
Read the following text. How far would you agree with the points raised? Have you experienced the situations described below from the point of view of a customer or business?
CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS
Many business people regard a customer complaint as a negative experience. However, if your business
handles complaints properly, previously unhappy customers may start singing your praises. Consider
a complaint as one of the best opportunities you have to show your commitment to creating another
satisfied customer. Customer loyalty is one of the biggest assets a business has; fight for this loyalty - be
passionate about it!
Complaints should be handled sympathetically and promptly. Some businesses believe that if they don't
receive many complaints, their customers must be satisfied. Wrong! Only a few customers will complain
to you. The majority will not return to your business and will tell others of their bad experience.
WHY SHOULD YOUR BUSINESS WELCOME COMPLAINTS?
Some published statistics say that:
a typical business hears from only 4% of its dissatisfied customers; the other 96% just go quietly away
and 91% of them will never come back;
a typical dissatisfied customer tells more than 8 people about his or her problem;
7 out of 10 complaining customers will do business with you again if you resolve the complaint
favourably.
HANDLING COMPLAINTS
Try putting the following points into practice:
Set up a complaints handling system and train your staff to handle complaints well;
Make it easy for customers to lodge a complaint;
Welcome customer complaints and deal with complaints promptly.
Find words and phrases in the text which mean:
1. take action in order to solve a problem (two synonyms):
2. showing your approval (idiom):
3. willingness to give your time and energy to something (noun):
4. useful qualities or advantages (plural noun):
5. repeatedly purchasing goods or services from one company; not changing for another company
(phrase):
6. immediately (adverb):
7. not satisfied (adjective):
8. to your advantage (adverb):
9. make an official complaint (phrase):
2 Typical complaints
Look at the following typical reasons for complaining in business. Match them to the possible
excuses/reasons on the right:
1. damaged goods a. a delay at the border
2. goods never arrived b. a lost invoice
3. a late delivery c. a missing order
4. an overcharge d. an accounting error
5. an overdue payment e. bad handling
6. lack of customer service f. business is short-staffed
Listen to four dialogues. Which complaint/excuse did you hear in each dialogue?
What action was decided on in each dialogue?
Dialogue 1:
Dialogue 2:
Dialogue 3:
Dialogue 4:
Listen again and complete the expressions from the dialogues:
1. I'm a __________we h_____________ a p__________ _________w your latest delivery.
2. I'm very s____________ about that. I'm afraid our driver was d____________ at the border again.
3. Leave it w____________ me. I will l____________ i________ the matter.
4. I'm c________ b________ we h_________ a p_________ with our order.
5. What s_________ to be the problem?
6. In what w__________ are they d__________ ?
7. I'm very sorry. This has never h__________ before. It must be d_______ to bad handling.
8. If you s_______ us back the d____________ sets, we'll send you r_______ immediately and
g_________ you a d__________ on your next order.
9. I a_________ again for any i__________ caused.
10. I'm c__________ about a m__________ on our invoice. It l___________ like you have
o__________ us by $50.
11. I'm s____________ about this. Our accounts department m____________ h__________made a small mistake when they processed your order.
12. We'll i___________ a c____________ invoice immediately.
13. I'm very sorry, madam. We are r__________ s_______ -s______________ at the moment.
14. Please w____________ here and I'll f____________ s__________ to help you.
No comments:
Post a Comment