is it okay: for the customer to always be right?
In my old place of work we had a framed A4 sheet of paper. I’m not sure how long it had been there – long enough to be vaguely yellowed and slightly water-stained, but I guess that’s to be expected for something stored over the sink. Titled “A Customer Is”, the document basically served as a reminder of why we were all there – to meet the needs of the paying public.
I like working in customer service. In the right job you can meet interesting people, have conversations ranging from state of the weather to the state of the world, or, at the very least, get some bizarre anecdotes to share when you get home. The six months I spent at McDonalds in high school would probably be enough for a book (albeit a very short book called something along the lines of “The Fight in the Drive Through”, “Archibald the Chip Machine” or “Build Your Own Burger: Adventures in Indecision”.)
However, hand in hand with working in customer service is the old adage “the customer is always right”. Though never officially told this, not even on the “A Customer Is” sheet, the fact is brought home time and time again in the way you are expected to respond to certain situations, and more often, in the way you must allow people to treat you.
In a customer service role, simply put, you have to be nice to customers. It’s logical. If you aren’t, they won’t come back, they might complain, and you, the business and probably the economy and world at large will fall into a big giant hole of bankruptcy, death and angst etc etc.
For the large part, customers are great. I’ve never had a very bad experience; just minor complaints about items or customers spilling their own food or drink and immediately demanding a free replacement. At worst I’ve had people deliberately making mess because they know you’ll have to clean it up. Nothing a good rant and a voodoo doll won’t fix. However, what happens when the customer is very clearly wrong, but you still have policy to uphold?
One of my friends works in a clothing store, and was helping a man adjust the length of some trousers he had bought. As she was pinning the hems, he looked down and said to her “On your knees where you belong.”
Creepy. When she told me, I heard it in Buffalo Bill’s voice. Part of me wonders if he hadn’t gone to buy trousers just to have young women touch his legs. At best, it is distasteful.
In this sort of situation you can’t go for the classic slap, glass of wine in the face or kick in the shins. You can’t even really call them a douche. You are working, and the person is a customer.
It’s hard enough to balance standing up for yourself and just letting things go in day to day life. When the complicating factor of customer service is thrown in, there are suddenly so many lines to navigate it becomes a bit like playing pick-up sticks on a chessboard. If a customer yells at you because they’re unhappy with the service, you just accept it. If they are physically violent, you take action. If a customer accidentally spills their drink, sees you, then smirks and throws the cup on the floor too, you still accept it. Through gritted teeth. If a customer’s eyes linger for too long on the parts of you that underwear are made to cover, or makes comments that sound like they’re straight out of the serial killer handbook of murder etiquette, you do…what?
In my friend’s case, she stopped serving Mr Creepy, and got a male colleague to take over. It’s a weird dynamic, outside of normal social rules. In general conversation, you are allowed an opinion and autonomy. In a customer service setting, it’s all a bit off kilter. So yes, a customer is the reason for work, what makes a business run, and not a nuisance (thank you “A Customer Is” sheet.) However, they are not always right, and, while you can look past people complaining about their own order or those who essentially swim in the mess they create, a customer doesn’t have the right to undermine your sense of self worth or act like a lecherous cretin. Do you want manners with that?
(Image credit: 1)
Hi,
I work in a retention department, so my job is even more-so based around taking crap from angry people and turning them around to re-sign with the company, but I disagree with the ending of your story.
If a customer crosses a line, like the creepy line you speak of, I call them on it, tell them they’ve gone too far, that I’m not going to take that kind of behaviour, if they persist them I tell them where to go, so to speak.
Admittedly, this is much easier in a call centre, as escape is a “terminate call” button away. I have worked face-to-face however, and in more cases than not, if you call someone on their shit, they’ll retreat and more often than not apologise while they’re at it.
I guess what I am saying is that no customer is worth the belittlement and abuse of the staff who serve them, and any boss worth their salt will back you up on this. If not, then get the hell outta there!
In the words of Larry David: “Most of the time, the customer is a moron and an asshole.”
Seriously though, where real bullying and harrassment is concerned, the customer service doctrine doesn’t hold up. In the case of what happened to your friend, that man contravened the server/client code and forfeited any right to being treated with servility. Respect in professional relationships needs to go both ways, and good employers will recognise this as well.
Once, when I was working in a bar, a customer (who, I gather, was perturbed by the price of the beer) leaned over the counter, dropped a ten dollar note into the sink in front of me and told me to pick it up. I did – I put it back on the counter and said I’d serve him when he decided to be civil. My manager asked me why I’d turned the man away; I explained, and he said I had done the right thing – they didn’t want people like that in their bar. At the same place, a woman refused to be served by a black colleague of mine because she was afraid he wouldn’t give her credit card back (yes, really). She didn’t get any service from the rest of us either.
In an earlier waitressing job (when I was still a minor), the staff wore aprons advertising a new wine called ‘Bird in the Hand’. After a succession of middle-aged businessmen had winked at me and said “two in the bush, hey?”, I told my boss I didn’t want to wear the apron any more and they let me go back to the Becks one.
Both of those employers recognised that, for the most part, staff with self-respect will create a genuine rapport with the public and be happy to serve them, whereas crawling, obsequious staff will wind up resenting both their customers and their employers.
Of COURSE you can’t go around being too sensitive. A thick skin is an important thing to have at work, and in life in general, and it definitely helps to keep in mind that the kind of people who bully waiters and shopkeepers tend to be ineffectual scum with no real power in any other area of their lives.
But when we let people get away with this sort of behaviour, we are encouraging them to keep displaying it, and this is exactly the sort of treatment we were all taught as kids that we musn’t put up with. Overt racism, sexual intimidation and opportunistic nastiness are not acceptable forms of conduct. Ever.
Let me get this straight. A man goes to buy a pair of trousers (yes dear, men go to clothes shops to buy trousers) and has some woman fawning all over his inside leg.
And…he’s the creep? I would have insisted on a male shop assistant. Would you have been comfortable with a male shop assistant fitting you for slacks? Don’t be a hypocrite.
He probably tried to difuse his embarrassment with humour. Remember, the shop was remiss for putting him in that position in the first place.
I think everyone has something to bring to the debate and the thing that Andybob The Troll should bring is silence.
Chris,
Andybob’s comment is completely innocuous.
Asking for his silence tells more than his comment ever did.
Why are you suggesting he shut-up?
Hi Elizabeth:
Thanks for sharing your article: “Is the Customer Always Right?”
For many years I have dealt with both the internal and external customer. What I have gathered is simply this:
“The Customer must always feel right.”
I look forward some more of your articles.