Customer service is at the top of my mind today. No, it's not just because this is Customer Service Week either. It's at the top of mind because I'm experiencing both good and bad examples of it centered around the same financial transaction.
My wife and I are in the process of purchasing a condo. We have contracted with a buyers agent and are arranging financing through the bank my wife and I use for our businesses.
Now our agent has been wonderful. He has gone above and beyond in making sure he has done everything he can to expedite the process. He has even taken to calling us just to check in and see if we need anything. This behavior is made to seem even better when placed next to the poor customer service we are receiving from our lender.
As we try to schedule closing, utilities, moving and the myriad of other things along with scheduling time off from business, the bank has been passive aggressive in communicating with us. Case in point. Yesterday morning I spoke with our loan officers assistant and asked if we could get an approximate date we could work with, knowing that the loan had gone to the underwriter 3 business days prior. She told me that she would speak with the loan officer when he got in and have him call me...... I'm still waiting on the call. In my world, that is unacceptable.
We could have gotten the very same loan through the developer but chose to use the bank we had experience with. We seem to have jumped to the wrong lilly pad.
Understand that this is not a difficult loan to approve. We are purchasing at below bank appraised value, we are borrowing less than half the purchase price, and we have qualified for a loan over 5 times the amount we are borrowing. I fail to see where the big holdup is.
I spend a significant portion of my time teaching employees how to treat customers. To take ownership of their issues and solve them like they were their own. It is much easier to keep a customer you have than to attract one to replace the customer you lost through inattention.
Simple common courtesy goes a very long way when dealing with customers. Most business aren't like the DMV, they have competitors. It would do them and their employees well to remember that simple fact. Without the customers there is no income to pay employees or cover expenses. The customer usually has options, as my long standing insurance company discovered earlier this year. They lost my family business, my business' business and my wife's business' business (yes I'm aware of how many times I just used the word business in one sentence!). They have been receiving premiums for years. The same may be in the near future for a certain bank I know!
Some businesses learn the hard way!
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