Successful organisations have long realised that delivering the best customer experience has a direct impact on their profits. Happier customers remain loyal, buy more and tell their friends about the good experience they’ve had. Upset customers move to your competitors and use social media to tell the world about the poor experience they’ve had to endure.This is backed up by research ...
Delivering a compelling customer experience to people paying income tax is always going to be difficult. The combination of complex forms and cost mean that many consumers rate the experience as marginally better, but financially more painful, than having a tooth removed.For HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) in the UK, the scale of its operations also provides a logistical challenge. In the 2011/12 fi...
The UK banking industry has often been criticised for complexity, high charges and poor choice for consumers. From misselling Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) to IT problems at RBS/NatWest there have been a steady stream of issues that have weakened consumer confidence in the banking sector.Many have pointed to a lack of choice and the perceived difficulty of switching accounts as being responsi...
As we’re now well into January, commentators are releasing a growing number of predictions for the customer service market in 2013.The latest is from industry analysts Forrester. While its full trend report will be published later in the month, it has released a sneak preview of where it sees the customer service industry going this year.Essentially it revolves around three areas:The need to...
In the run up to Christmas shoppers naturally expect a high level of customer service from retailers. In store they want helpful staff, sufficient stock and no queues at the checkouts. Online they want a straightforward ordering process, a clear acknowledgement of their purchase and to be kept informed about delivery progress.As we’ve already found not all retailers are managing to provide t...
Today, customer service is a global industry. Consumers all across the world are demanding faster responses to their questions – and increasingly the power of the internet and technology means that the answers can come from contact centre agents located in different countries.Africa is a growing location for contact centres due to its skilled workforce with multiple languages and strong ties...
Today, the customer really is king. The combination of ever increasing competition and greater customer expectation mean you need to deliver higher and higher levels of service, whatever sector you operate in.And, to be fair, most organisations understand the importance of customer service but many are failing to deliver what consumers actually want. This could be down to a lack of budget, not lis...
Excellent customer service combines great people and strong processes, underpinned with the right technology. Experience shows that it is vital that these three elements are balanced – after all the best people can’t do their jobs if their IT doesn’t provide them with accurate and up to date information that meets their needs.Unfortunately we’ve all heard stories of well-in...
It is fair to say that the rise of social media worries many organisations. It provides a very public way for customers to communicate with you and to complain. And unlike traditional channels such as email and phone, what customers say (and how you respond) is visible to the entire world. This, and the widespread belief that social media is solely used for negative comments mean some companies ha...
Eptica and NHS Business Services Authority (NHS BSA), have won the Most Effective Use of Self Service category at the prestigious 2012 Customer Contact Association (CCA) Excellence Awards. NHS BSA has seen training time for new agents drop by 30% and first year savings of £121,000 since its Eptica-powered self-service knowledge management technology project called Sherlock went live.Sherlock...