Hello Everyone
I just returned with Priscilla from two weeks in Vietnam. We stayed at three Six
Senses Resorts. www.sixsenses.com and at
the Park Hyatt in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon). The service was exceptional
everywhere we went in Vietnam. Everyone speaks English and everyone delivers
professional caring service.
We flew over on Asiana Airlines which is a Korean Airline out of JFK. They were
just excellent. The staff from the flight attendants to the employees at the
check in counters to the people working in their airport clubs made US airline
companies look like armatures. Even Vietnam Airlines was great.
US airlines CEO’s need to get out of their offices and go find out why their days
are numbered because of the level of service they deliver vs. what the international
airlines are delievering. We flew back also on Asiana to JFK. We had flown
business class so we used Asiana Airline Lounges/Clubs in the airports in Ho Chi Minh City
and in Soule Korea while we waited for our next flight. The clubs were
spectacular with nice food, great attentive service, great business centers and wonderful decor.
When we got to JFK we had a four hour layover to catch our American Airlines flight
home to Orlando. I bought two passes one day passes at $50.00 each for their Admirals Club to
make the wait less painful. The club was a disgrace. The food was a plastic bin
with bagels and muffins and some coffee urns with coffee and hot water and some
cold water and OJ. That is it. Later they put out some apples and some mixed salty
snacks which had zero creativity and attention to detail.
The attendant working the room did not even clean up dirty dishes laying around.
Actually she did not do much of anything. We are talking about one of the
world’s busiest airports. Later we got on the flight to Orlando. The desk
agents and the flight attendants did only what they had to do. They displayed
no enthusiasm for their job. They were more like prison guards making sure you
follow the rules. No wonder American Airlines went bankrupt. And by the way Asiana was a
whole lot cheaper than the US airlines.
Next we get to Orlando after traveling for 42 hours back from Vietnam. Priscilla was
hungry so we called in an order to Five Guys. No one answered the phone to take
our order. We waited a few minutes and called back. Finally Ryan answered the
phone and said, “I will be right with you,” and he laid the phone
down. For the next 10 minutes we listened to orders being taken from customer
in the store. Ryan never came back. We hung up again and called back and no one
answered the phone. We waited again for a couple of minutes and called back.
This time Ryan answered and I told him that he never came back to take our
order after laying down the phone. He said, “It is our policy to take care
of the customers in the store before the ones calling in.” I told him that
was a bad policy and hard to believe, but he stuck to his story. I gave him our
order for two burgers and two fries.
When I arrived to pick up the order a few minutes later I asked the fellow on the
cash register if he was Ryan. He said no I am Brian. I asked if there was a
Ryan and he pointed to a fellow over by the grill and said, “That is
Ryan.”I told Brian my story about Ryan telling me their policy was to take care of
customers in the store before the ones calling in and I would like to
understand if that is really their policy because if it is, it is not a good
one and if it is I want to talk to a manager as we are good customers who enjoy
Five Guys and that such a policy makes no sense.
Brian said to me, ” I did not say that was our policy. When we are busy I have
someone like Ryan answer the phone while I take care of the customers in
line.” The rest of his explanation was not understandable. It was not
understandable because Brian was more interested in being right than he was in
saying he was sorry and listening to my feedback for him.
I tried to hand him one of my Creating Magic bookmarks and tell him I was writing
a new book titled, The Customer Rules. His arrogance reared its ugly head again
as he refused to accept the bookmark and said without even looking at the
bookmark, “I don’t need this.”
Brian I believe was the supervisor and a wanna be manager because I told him I
wanted to speak to a manager and he told me his manager was a district manager
by the name of Megan Frosch and her number was 407-267-4794 and I could call
her.
Brian is a typical example of someone representing a brand that has been selected to
be a customer contact person but has not had any training on how to handle
customer feedback including complaints. He is not unusual. Many companies have made this same mistake.
We have had trouble before with calling in orders but in the past have just let it
go. It is obvious they don’t have good processes and systems for handling call
in orders. Five Guys food is good but not that good.
Two lessons here are: 1) get out and visit your buiness as a customer to find out the truth 2) teach your employees to say they are sorry and listen respectfully to the customer instead of stroking their own ego by being defensive and showing off in front of their employees. Only win arguments with the customers you don’t ever want to see again.
Since I am suffering from Jet Lag I am now going to take a nap…..Send me more customer stories good and bad for my book at; Lee@LeeCockerell.com….Have agood weekend…Lee