Seamless service is a win for the customer

High quality service is seamless and is without doubt good for business. We all know what a seam is — the line where two pieces of cloth are sewn together. I consider seamless service as one that is smooth and consistent.

It is service that has no apparent gaps between one department or person and the other; it has no evident interruptions along the chain. Customers experience seamless service when every employee successfully carries out his or her tasks.

Seamless service does not happen by chance; it starts by understanding customer requirements and ends when these requirements are met. Such service is only possible if employees fully recognise their individual roles in making seamless customer service a reality.

Many of us recall the dark days when service in most companies was dreadful. One would be tossed from department to department, office to office, person to person. In the process, calls would be dropped, documents lost, and time wasted.

As a result, customers felt unwanted, unappreciated, and undeserving. Many longed for the day when they would have their rightful place at the core of organisations and as the reason for every business’s existence.

Today, many organisations both public and private have taken major steps towards patching up the seams in their service areas. It is no longer a preserve of premier customers to have a personal banker, many banks and other smart companies have clear-cut seamless customer communication processes.

It is no longer common for customers to meander through organisations for assistance. They have access to customer the care hotlines, email addresses, and social media contacts of their service providers. When I am seeking a service provider, my expectation is that their service will be seamless and painless.

As I pondered the elections, my hope too was that IEBC and its partnering organisations would be seamless in their operations. Seamless service remains a win not only for customers but also for staff and the public at large. Staff eagerly accept compliments and many detest complaints from service failures. Many consider it fulfilling to work in a high performance environment where seamless service is a priority.

Many will admit that though difficult, it is possible to provide seamless service. Staff can be helped to create such service through well-defined processes and standards. How are the phones answered? What process is used to manage walk-in customers? Who responds to emails that are received through the customer care email address? How are complaints managed? Who follows up on enquiries and keeps the customer updated? What promises should be made and how do we ensure that we keep them? How do we measure whether we are meeting customer expectations consistently? Are we measuring the length of our queues, the time taken to deliver a new order among others.

If we offer seamless service, we need to consider it as the main reason our customers will come back. If customers are leaving, it is time to find out the holes through which they are falling off. Smart companies know that consistently sealing any weak chains in the service delivery process makes them stand out.

Lucy Kiruthu is a management consultant and can be reached on lucy@evolve-consultants.com or via twitter @kiruthulucy