I don’t know about you, but sometimes when I have a customer service issue with a business I’m working with, I don’t care if they get it resolved immediately. I realize that I’m not the center of their universe, as nice as that would be. I’m just one of many customers, especially when I’m dealing with mega corporations. In fact, some of them probably wouldn’t even notice if I suddenly stopped being a customer of theirs.
Having said that, there is one easy thing they can do to make me happy: After I’ve initiated a service request/question, let me know that you’re working on it. And I don’t mean one of those canned auto-response emails that I often get after submitting an email to a business. I’m talking about a short reply from a real person when they start working on my issue. Or, if there’s a back log of other problems or a delay in resolving mine, just say so. I can respect, and even tolerate that. Just don’t keep me in the dark.
I say this after faxing some papers to our mortgage lender earlier today. I have no idea if they’re working on my problem, when I can expect resolution, or if they received the fax in the first place. It’s like sending something into a black hole.
What do you think? Am I asking too much of businesses? Keeping customers up-to-date seems like something really easy, but I don’t come across many companies that actually do it…