3 weeks ago Michelin offered to refund 120,000 tickets for the US Grand Prix.

Although this is not a parallel example.

Is the customer always right?
When they are wrong?
When it costs us money?

Are views different across the Atlantic?

The Customer Is Always Right came to the UK in the 90's from America.

A company I worked for tried it to a certain level of success.

From my own thinking it should be applied to a certain level of financial impact on the service provider. The basis for this assumption is that the cost of arguing the opposing view with the customer leading to long AHT, investigation, escalation, complaint and ultimately customer attrition far outweighs the cost of recompense and apologising without question.

Obviously there has to be a limit and also rules in case a precedence is set that has long term negative implications but it goes hand in hand with agent empowerment.

Commercially I like it, personally I like it even more ;)

Short answer...no.

Although in todays world, with so many companies competing for customer loyalty, the case is often a resounding yes.

I've worked in call centres of one kind or another for most of my career, first as and agent working my way through OPs, IT, MI and one thing always tops the bill...Customer complaints.

From a personal standpoint (and like many of you out there) I want stuff for free (or as little as possible :) ) I want the best deal I can get.

If a customer complains enough, generally they get what they want, just to keep them loyal, if they don't someone else will pick them up and make them happy.
I know this I switched mobile telephone suppliers because I was being washed
about.

Bottom line. The customer is not always right, but they'll get what they want if they complain enough.

....it's the principle of the thing.............. :)

But I don't think it is anymore.

Now, companies with good customer service treat customers fairly - and whilst this doesn't always make them popular it works. The customer is always right, unless they're wrong.

This often goes hand-in-hand with the move towards a lot of products being "no-frills".

Take EasyJet as an example. The customer is not right when they turn up five minutes after the check-in desk closes. Even though the easy, and cheapest, thing for them to do would be to get the customers on that flight - they don't.

Most customers are happy to accept that they missed the flight because they were late.

Regards,
db

"The Customer Is Always Right came to the UK in the 90's from America. "

Now let me see. I am over 40 now. When I was doing saturday work about 25 years ago (the 80s), I workd in a department store. The rule was 'The Customer is always right'

I belive that we sent the message to the states not the other way. Come on England is know as the nation of shop keepers.

If you type "The Customer Is Always Right" on Google there are loads of very interesting entries concerning how it just doesnt work in retail (or business) anymore - since the customer often isnt a customer at all - often a liar, thief or cheat. I'm amazed I identified something here without even knowing it.

However the real origin of the phrase is......British

Origin

Slogan coined by H. Gordon Selfridge, 1857-1947, the founder of the Selfridge chain stores.

(courtesy of The Phrase Finder)

Nuff said

Tremendous.
Not only a call centre forum but valuable history lessons too. :)

Cheers,

C.

I expect there is an almost inherent formula to calculating this.

Alot of companies do assume the customer is right for simple financial reasons. Of course...this can create an expectation and a snowball effect that could be financial impacting.

As such I think that most companys setup "levels" of pushback. ie: 80% of issues are resolved at the $10 credit level, some get pushed past that.

That being said its not always money. We had one poor bloke that is getting free internet for life from an old company I worked for to make up for some grevious customer service problems he encountered. We could have just as easily terminated his account but I think some companies do feel responsiblity.

it is way too early...