How to have those discussions you've been dreading

It's 9am on a Monday. Your less-than-favourite customer has phoned and spoken with your colleague. He has demanded an immediate return phone call from you and said that he hopes you've "got up off your butt and sorted his problem out". Clearly you're in for a stellar day.

Before you delve into procrastination land and decide it might be better to take a mental health day, take pause and read the tips below on how to have those discussions you've been dreading with your less-than-favourite customer.

Tips

* Prior to calling the customer, analyse the information you have available to you. Plan what you want to say in the discussion. Anticipate what the customer may ask. Being prepared will make you feel more confident during the tough moments in the conversation.

* Give the customer your full name at the beginning of the discussion. This makes you accountable for what you are saying and also provides a personal reference for the customer.

* Manage your time. Don't make the call if you only have five minutes to spend with the customer. This will only create a pressure-cooker situation for both you and the customer because you will be watching the clock instead of focusing on the conversation.

* Listen. It seems simple and it is. It's also the most effective tip you can take away from this post. Listen to what is being said and acknowledge the customer's frustration. It will make them feel heard.

* Use silence. Silence is another incredibly effective tool to manage difficult discussions.

* Adapt your language to match the customers. People are usually 'seers' or 'hearers'. You can pick this up from the language they use. Be aware of this and try to match their style.

*Confusing discussions are like a maze. You need to guide the other party through the conversation so that you both come out the other end together. You do this by separating out the issues. Break them down, discuss them and join them up again later once you have educated the customer on the issue from your perspective.

* If the customer does have confusing information, let them speak first and then advise them you are going to clarify the information they have provided. This lets the customer know that you are going to ask them a number of questions.

* Let the customer know what you're going to say. Say what you need to say. Tell the customer what you said. An oldie but a goodie.


If you would like to read some more tips for difficult telephone discussions, click here.

Fix this now!

Those of us who work in the complaint handling world are all to familiar with customers wanting an immediate response to their complaint. "I want this fixed now", "call me back immediately" and "I'm just going to keep calling until this is resolved" are commonly used phrases by complainants, usually with some colourful language and punctuation thrown in.

But how do we deal with customers who have unrealistic expectations about complaint handling timeframes? The NSW Ombudsman has provided some guidelines and suggested scripts for dealing with customers who make demands about how their complaint should be handled, including insisting on an immediate response.

Suggested Strategies

• Inform the customer that it is your organisation and not them that decides how the complaint will be handled, by whom, and the amount of resources to be dedicated to it.
• Tell them clearly, transparently and firmly from the outset how the organisation intends to deal with the complaint.
• Be honest and upfront about what will and will not happen and what is and is not possible.
• Explain that an immediate response is not possible because there are other demands on the organisation's time, there are processes that must be followed and that the organisation deals with complaints on a first come first served basis - and there other complaints that came in before their own.

Suggested Scripts

Perhaps no-one has taken the time to explain the complaints process to you. Let me.

I appreciate that you want this dealt with right away. But I'm sure that you can also understand that I do have several other complaints that I have to deal with in addition to yours and which were brought to my attention first.

We deal with complaints on a first come first served basis, and as you can imagine, there are files that came in before yours. I'll be in contact with you in [days/ weeks] or sooner if I need more information from you.

Most people who complain to us consider that their complaint is the most important one and want us to deal with it right away or ahead of other complaints. That's not possible in practice.

It's clear this is important to you and you want it handled in a certain way, but there is a process that I must follow to make sure that it's dealt with appropriately and fairly for everyone involved.

I know you feel your complaint is urgent. I've assessed it and have decided I should call the officer/ organisation concerned. I'll be able to do this sometime this week/ I'll need some time to do this and then to receive a response from them. How about you call me [days/weeks] and hopefully I'll have some information for you then?

Ultimately, if you are unhappy with the way we are handling your complaint you are free to raise it with another organisation.


I sometimes use a variation of the last suggested script when a customer says that the organisation is delaying the handling of their complaint. In those instances I will suggest to the customer: If you consider that we are hindering the progression of your matter, I can close your complaint and you are able to take it up in another forum. A word of warning - you have to be very careful with the tone you use and your delivery of this phrase because it can be very easily interpreted as being antagonistic.

National Investigations Symposium

Last week I attended the 9th National Investigations Symposium at the Novotel Manly Pacific. The conference is run by the Independent Commission Against Corruption NSW, the NSW Ombudsman and the Institute of Public Administration Australia (NSW Division).

 

The aim of the forum is to help investigators and complaint-handlers to increase their investigative knowledge, skills and techniques by:

 

• hearing about best practice methods and new techniques
• learning from distinguished international and national keynote speakers
• attending workshops on managing difficult complainants, the basics about how to conduct an investigation, investigative interview techniques or administrative law for investigators.

 

One of the sessions I attended was a workshop run by the NSW Ombudsman on Unreasonable Complainant Conduct. With the support and involvement of the other Australasian Parliamentary Ombudsman, the NSW Ombudsman began a joint project on managing unreasonable complainant conduct in 2006. The project sought to minimise the often disproportionate and unreasonable impacts of difficult complainant conduct on organisations, their staff, services, time and resources by proposing a framework of strategies for managing such conduct.

 

The outcome of this project has been a practice manual titled Managing Unreasonable Complainant Conduct and the associated workshop. The manual provides an extensive range of strategies for dealing with unreasonable complainant conduct, including circumstances where it is not possible to terminate services to a complainant.

 

I found this workshop to be quite helpful as it was useful to hear of the experiences of other complaint handlers from different organisations. However, the star of this project is definitely the practice manual. Divided into seven parts, the practice manual provides guidelines on identifying unreasonable complainant conduct, preventing such conduct and responding to and managing the same. There are also some helpful suggested semantics for dealing with unreasonable complainant conduct. 

 

An example of one scenario that has a scripted response is around when a complainant presents in the organisation’s office and advises they will not be leaving until the matter is resolved. 

Complainant: I’m not leaving. You’ll have to carry me out of here.

Respondent: I’m not going to force you to leave. It’s really up to you what happens next. I’m going to leave and if you want to stay here a little while to think, then that’s fine. But if you aren’t gone in twenty minutes, we’ll have to contact security/ the police to escort you out of the office. It’s up to you.

This script is firm but fair. It reminds the complainant that they have a choice in their behaviour and also demonstrates that the respondent is in control of the investigative process. The majority of the scripts offered by the NSW Ombudsman have this same approach.  

Needless to say, I have placed this practice manual in an easy-to-reach location on my desk because I know it will become a highly used resource.

If you would like to know more about the NSW Ombudsman’s Managing Complainant Conduct project, click here.

To find out more about the 9th National Investigations Symposium, click here.