Customer service issue.

[Abba-Dabba]

Take the high road. Apologize and move on. This is not a normal customer transaction and should not be treated as such. And it's definitely not someone trying to get money back on a McDouble after eating it. This is someone who won a prize, claimed it, spent extra money in the store that they probably didn't have to, and told a final redemption would be in 2 weeks. 5 weeks from winning and winner still not able to claim prize because not of their own doing. Whether she paid for item or not is invalid. She was promised by said time, time was broken because of lack of attention to detail by staff and ownership. What the total costs to the store is not relevant. Winner does not need to be made to feel guilty by how much money you spent to fix a situation you are responsible for. Take the ill review lumps and try to learn from it.

[El Jefe]

Originally Posted by Buzz_TinBalls

under normal work circumstances, I'd agree with floppy, but the wedding dynamic is one you can't **** with. live & learn.

I might ask the employee to fork over company damages, just to drive it home.

No way, if he has one employee (IIRC he only has one) and he trusts them and she trusts her, he will lose their trust and maybe her employment if he asks her to pay for the costs. This type of situation is the cost of doing business. A business accepts responsibility for their employees actions, lets face it, mistakes happen and they suck. All you can do is try to fix the situation, educate those involved and try to prevent it from happening again. If she did the same thing over and over again, I would fire her if she continually did it, but that isn't the case here.

[Consistent1]

Originally Posted by Buzz_TinBalls

under normal work circumstances, I'd agree with floppy, but the wedding dynamic is one you can't **** with. live & learn.

I might ask the employee to fork over company damages, just to drive it home.

Women and their wedding bullshit is serious business for sure. My ex and her mother damn near drove me crazy with that shit, and it was more her mother.

[Al Bundy]

Originally Posted by Consistent1

Women and their wedding bullshit is serious business for sure. My ex and her mother damn near drove me crazy with that shit, and it was more her mother.

Mothers are the worst. They are living vicariously through their daughters at that point. Those old bitches realize their romantic lives are over at this point because they're wrinkled. So of course they want to be in control of the wedding.

[TribalElder]

You could use this service for dealing with customer complaint issues

NSFW
http://foaas.com/

[WhawhaWhat]

Customer was told the service would be done in 2 weeks, it ended up taking 5 weeks and still wasn't completed so the customer wrote a bad review.

I don't see what the customer did wrong.

[NewChief]

Originally Posted by WhawhaWhat

Customer was told the service would be done in 2 weeks, it ended up taking 5 weeks and still wasn't completed so the customer wrote a bad review.

I don't see what the customer did wrong.

Did I say the customer had done something wrong?

Originally Posted by WhawhaWhat

Customer was told the service would be done in 2 weeks, it ended up taking 5 weeks and still wasn't completed so the customer wrote a bad review.

I don't see what the customer did wrong.

The customer got something for free and these fine folks spent hundreds of dollars getting it right. Even though it took longer, it was free. There's no call to trash them on the internet. It was free.

[1moreTRich]

I am a online review junkie. Most every purchase I make or hotel I stay at I read reviews on, if they are available. I appreciate when the owner gets a bad review and has an explanation, it gives me a sense that they care about their image and they are willing to go above and beyond to make customers happy and keep their brand strong.

If it were my business, I would have a short courteous response about what went down, explain how it was your fault (don't blame the customer at all) and what you are doing to make sure this doesn't happen again. I use those businesses much more than someone with average to good reviews that don't comment.

Originally Posted by 1moreTRich

I am a online review junkie. Most every purchase I make or hotel I stay at I read reviews on, if they are available. I appreciate when the owner gets a bad review and has an explanation, it gives me a sense that they care about their image and they are willing to go above and beyond to make customers happy and keep their brand strong.

If it were my business, I would have a short courteous response about what went down, explain how it was your fault (don't blame the customer at all) and what you are doing to make sure this doesn't happen again. I use those businesses much more than someone with average to good reviews that don't comment.

Outstanding contribution to the discussion. Well done.

[unlurking]

Originally Posted by Phobia

The customer got something for free and these fine folks spent hundreds of dollars getting it right. Even though it took longer, it was free. There's no call to trash them on the internet. It was free.

Assuming you mean there's no call to trash the business, I have to disagree a bit here. As you stated earlier, you run into delays in your business as well, but you are not on such a hard deadline. If homeowner's have to use their guest bath for an extra few weeks, it's an inconvenience. Delays in event oriented businesses are a little more significant and may lead to unsuccessful events. You can always return to fix a problem at one of your customers. Couples can't just redo their weddings.

And regards to the "customer got something free" comment, I really dislike this line of thinking. Businesses don't give away products/services free out of the goodness of their hearts. The business is trading for publicity, marketing, customer reviews, site traffic, store traffic, etc. If the business follows through and actually provides a quality product or service, they will receive a return. If instead they reach behind them and grab some reject out of a garbage bin and hand it to the customer, they should expect a negative return. This is a chance to "show" how good you or your products are. Just because it was free the consumer is supposed to give you a mulligan and assume you are better than shown and recommend you to friends?

I'm with Boise_Chief. Simple and personal. A public response vie social media would be overboard IMO. I think you've done more than enough to attempt to resolve the issue, but a final apology/congratulations I think would be a sincere ending.

[blaise]

You know, NewChief, you might want to look around and see if she's bad mouthing you in other sites that allow customer reviews.

[NewChief]

As an FYI:

The only post she's made so far was only in her own Facebook feed (public, and a friend told us that she'd made it). If it were on a public review site (Yelp, google, etc..), I'd definitely reply and explain what happened.

I'm not going to go on her personal facebook feed, look like a stalker, and reply there, though.

[mikeyis4dcats.]

here's a free piece of advice.

Treat every customer exactly the same, whether they used a coupon, bought a GC for pennies on the dollar at a charity event, received a GC for a present, or opened up their wallet in front of you and pulled out greenbacks.

The minute you started viewing this customer as something less than a "customer" is a problem.

It is not the customer's fault they used a coupon or a GC, YOU were the one that made it available for use....

[NewChief]

Originally Posted by mikeyis4dcats.

here's a free piece of advice.

Treat every customer exactly the same, whether they used a coupon, bought a GC for pennies on the dollar at a charity event, received a GC for a present, or opened up their wallet in front of you and pulled out greenbacks.

The minute you started viewing this customer as something less than a "customer" is a problem.

It is not the customer's fault they used a coupon or a GC, YOU were the one that made it available for use....

I'm pretty sure that we treated the customer the same (as evidenced by us spending money to make it right). I'm just providing context of why it's a little galling.

That's good advice though and very hard in this line of work. You have people who are going to drop 5k on invites and others who can't afford 500. Often the lower end clients are more difficult to deal with as well because they want value for cheap.

But we constantly discuss that everyone deserves to be made to feel special for their wedding regardless if budget.