I’m just off the phone with a phone company who botched a service call to our business big time: an unpleasant rep scheduled a service call, tech didn’t show, called the company to discover no record of the appointment, “nothing we can do”, etc.

(An interesting note: the original rep, who acted inconvenienced by my office manager’s call, ended the conversation by saying, “I assume you’ll want to score me a 10 on the service I provided?” Nothing like gaming the evaluation system…)

I spent 30 minutes scouring their website which seems dedicated to prevent you from contacting the company directly. I left messages for two high level executives that I never heard back from but  I was eventually able to uncover the CEO’s number and his assistant sent our problem to the escalation department. Normally these service representatives are the best of the best.

Not in this case. The only “resolution” offered was that they come back next Wednesday, a week after the failed appointment.

What? That’s it? You couldn’t make it happen today? Sooner? What about the wasted time and effort (literally hours) spend by our office manager and me?

“Let’s cut to the chase, sir,” came the response from Ms. Escalation, “you want money.”

So delicate and diplomatic. But guess what? For me I didn’t want MONEY–I wanted ACTION; I wanted an indication that my business mattered.

It wasn’t about the money. It was about the principle.

I’d rather have the wasted time back and the frustration gone. I was trying to figure out if the company was willing to do anything to somehow demonstrate that they valued my business. They said they did but their actions indicated that they didn’t.

When we make mistakes on product orders, we do our best to compensate for the problem: we’ll include a free product, a credit, rescind the charge–something. It doesn’t cost us much but it proves we are serious about taking care of the customer. And it makes the customer happy.

For some customers is it about the money, but even if it is, there’s no need to be crass about it. Why not say, “Would it help to credit you something for your inconvenience?” How would this phone company respond to my explanation, “I forgot to pay my bill this month but I assure you I’ll make sure it gets paid next month. After all, I value our relationship.”?

Recently my wife Darla dealt with another service provider’s high-level service rep. When I told her of my experience, she said, “Exactly how I was treated.”

That makes me wonder: are some volume service providers trying to dumb down our expectations? Are we to be like Flounder in Animal House: “May I have another sir?”

There’s always a silver lining. Those service providers who do figure out how to politely and promptly solve problems and prove their commitment to customers stand out. They get talked about positively. They create long-term commitment instead of short-term revenue. They raise their retention rates and improve their service ratings.

And those are really powerful benefits for doing service recovery right.

Feedback is useful if you act on it. I write books as honestly and as well as I can to help readers.

Someone wrote a less than nice review that one of my books was full of my pet peeves.  I write about my experiences to provide real life illustrations. I don’t need to make up stories–I just report on what I observe and experience.

In the example cited by the reviewer, I did not mention any of the bad service providers by name (most unhappy customers don’t extend that courtesy). Instead, I focused on what could have been done to avoid or fix the problem.

My so called pet peeves are the same kinds of things that literally hundreds of readers, clients and audience members have shared with me that bother them too.

Customers’ pet peeves–irritants, problems and dissatisfactions–are golden opportunities if you act upon them rather than simply grouse about them.

Customers let you know what’s wrong, and arguing rarely if ever helps your cause.

Find out what’s bugging your customers and fix it. Find out what your competition is doing that bothers customers and make sure you don’t do it too. Customers will notice, appreciate it and do more business with you.

The customer’s pet peeve is your golden opportunity.

Instead, thank them for being honest and do what you can to un-peeve them.

Today I visited my local bagel shop. Let’s call it “Smart Guys.” It is so close to my house that I could easily walk there. I used to frequent the place until they were frequently out of the bagels I wanted. I didn’t do statistical analysis on how often they didn’t have what I wanted; I just got tired of the “sorry, we’re out” and stopped going.

Today my boys wanted bagels. So I tried again. Guess what? They were out of one of the two bagel types I wanted. I mentioned this to the “assistant manager.” He was a pleasant fellow and explained how that sometimes happens.

No apology.

No “What can I do to make it right?”

No, “We value your business.”

I was mellow. I was conversational. I didn’t get excited. After all, I’ve lived a full life without their product for quite some time now. I can live long and prosper if I don’t go back again.

In a better world, the assistant manager or the manager (lurking in the background doing important things) would have been engaged and maybe a little excited. In this economy it is tough getting customers in the door. You want them to come back, not go away disappointed.

For them, it was business as usual.

Customer service mistakes are made all the time. We make them in my office despite our very best efforts. What should do you when they occur?

First, APOLOGIZE. That should be self-evident but I rarely experience it. If you aren’t genuinely sorry you disappointed a customer–for whatever reason–you need to find a different line of work.

Second, EMPATHIZE. Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. How  would you feel if you wanted to give someone your hard-earned money but you didn’t get what you were willing to pay for? You don’t necessarily have to agree with the customer’s reasoning but you do need to understand why and how they feel.

Third, MAKE IT RIGHT. Think really, really hard about what you can do to prove you value the customer’s business. Here’s a kooky idea: why not give them a free bagel to make up for the fact they couldn’t buy the one they wanted? The cost is miniscule but the impact is major. Or how about a coupon for a free bagel on the next visit (there’s a nice way to get them to come back. Just make sure you’re not out of bagels again).

Finally, MAKE IT EASY TO COMPLAIN. I couldn’t find any customer feedback cards at Smart Guys Bagels but was able to track them down online. I emailed my feedback to see if, when and how they’d respond. The only thing worse than a complaint you get is a complaint you don’t get.

Like most things in life, service recovery is simple. It means knowing what to do to prove you appreciate the customer and then doing it.

It also means teaching everyone on your team these simple techniques and making sure they use them.