Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Customer Service: Refund Policy

Hi,

I am discussing with John Lau of St. James about refund policy and customer service yesterday.

Our discussion is about whether a service organization should refund if the customer's refund request is not due to dissatisfaction. He has already used up the product and he just wants to get his money back. My opinion is do the refund. If you tell someone that only dissatisfaction can get the refund, he will then claim that he is not satisfy with whatever!

John said that it is quite impossible in social service organization like St. James to do it like that. I do understand his difficulties because St. James has a very strict audit control. The money they earned goes to serving the people in need!

In those commercial organizations, which operate "refund under any condition" policy, not everyone will have such kind of request. Most of us are reasonable people, particularly if we are serving a vast majority of repeated customers (熟客). We have developed a long-term relationship. Relationship is more than money.

Decision in customer service sometimes can be not easy!

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel