hi people,
One of my most patronised customer is threatening to leave me because of a bad experience they had with my company. I dont know what to do? i intend to write them... or any suggestions on how to win them back? urgent

Well what I would suggest would be to first apologize, apologize, and then apologize some more. I have found that if you identify with your customers and let them know that you understand their frustrations it tends to take the wind right out of their sails. Another good tool is to offer them a small discount off of their future order with you. I hope this helps :)

Over the apology I suggest to demonstrate the force what you and your company will do to avoid the same bad experience.
The demonstration sould mean that some hihg level manager and you together explain how could it be happened (to show that you understand the real problem) and after describe the steps do be done to avoid the same again.
The other good thing is to involve the customer into the working-out the solution.

dezo / [url=http://devai.hu/firka][/url] (in hungarian - sorry...)

It's definitely always important to put yourself in your customer's shoes and to profusely thank him for their contribution to making your company even better. If it wasn't for complaints you wouldn't know what to change or improve.

I agree that you should offer them a discount, however, be cautious of this. You don't want to make the customer feel you're patronizing him.

Try to talk to them before writing. Very important. They must hear you. That way you can also get more feedback on the situation.

I am unsure what business you are in but have you thought about paying your best Customer a face to face visit? If he or she is your best Customer they need to also get that feeling from you.

Getting in front of the Customer gives them the opportunity to vent, gives them the feeling that you care and allows you to strengthen the relationship. If your business is based on the 80/20 rule, then take care of your best Customers because they are taking care of you.

1. First you need to apologize to customer. Not Over Phone. Go and meet him.

2. Listen to him on his concerns (Even if he shouts listen to him) and do not justify.

3. After listening to him, convey your eagerness to resolve his issue immediately.

4. If you have escalation mechnism do escalate and put your Team members to correct the errors immeidately if not resolved till now.

5. Please bring in your senior officials to meet the customer. While meeting him, please visit customer in group of the corresponding engineer , you and your senior official.

6.Communicate the actions taken and suggest if any precaution available thru' mail or letter.

7. Talk to him for everyday another one week on the status of corrected problem.

ask the CUSTOMER what they would like you to do. Some people dont like an offer of discount, instead they want the problem fixed and resolved so they wont have the same thing happen to them in the future. Discounts will not fix the problem.

Let him know he is important
think from his view point
talk to him personally
find out whats best for him
give him many options

I would suggest not to apologize for that a limit coz it makes him remeber the problems again and agian . Talk using positive language think forward for the options that you can give and to sort out the problems.

Excellent suggestions here. When talking to your customer (as said, do it in person!), use this technique called "forbidden to solve". When you talk to your customer, ask only open questions... questions that you cannot answer with yes or no. Summarize a lot, to get a clear understanding. This will not only make you an active listener, but the customer also gets the feeling that you listen to him/her.

Then, when you have a clear understanding of the problem: fix it! FAST!

One of my most patronised customer is threatening to leave me because of a bad experience they had with my company.
Lesson to learn: it takes only one(!) bad experience. Make sure that you have the customer service culture, customer focus, and customer service rep empowerment to solve issues as they arise.

Kind regards,

Erwin.

The first thing is to visit the customer and apologise to him/her directly say how you feel sorry about the occurance ,and put in place structures that will either minimise or completly eliminate such an occurrance in future.

thresa75, I scrolled down this page carefully and didn't see your name after your original question. This makes me wonder whether you reconsidered your options on where to post questions into a forum, even when it concerns a desperate concern over a customer that could be lost. Have you found an answer? Did you intend to find one?

Hi,
I want to believe that you best pay a personal visit to this customer of yours as this will give them some measure of respite.
The fact that you are doing a follow up on the issue means you are serios in wanting to address and redress the wrong done.