Every company out there knows that it is near impossible to not receive customer complaints at some point, on some level. However, they’re not all doom and gloom, and something to worry about. As Bill Gates says, “your most unhappy customer is your greatest source of learning”.
But do you have the right complaint management solutions at hand? To fully utilise the power of customer feedback and complaints, you should be handling them and responding to them skilfully and in line with your company values.
Like most things now, complaints are accompanied by data. They can help you to identify emerging or systemic issues within a sector. Data evaluation is quintessential to business growth and success. It’s exactly the same for complaint management.
Modern complaint management
Customer complaints have drastically changed in recent years. Where they used to put pen to paper and post off their complaints, they now they have a myriad of engagement channels to vent on. These channels include those that are accessible by the company only to receive direct, private feedback. And there’s also those public channels where any and all future and past customers can see complaints written in to warn others.
But modern complaint management has advanced especially as customer service teams have become far more reliant on technology. Equally, a greater focus on consumer vulnerability and the wider impact of complaints started to take precedence. The cost-of-living crisis has left everyone worse for wear and in more need of help.
Each problem experienced and expressed by a customer is now treated with more care and understanding than ever before. This is to ensure customers feel supported during the complaint handling process. And this is a welcome change. Customers now recognise organisations that are focused on getting problems solved. Those companies that are keen to put up their defence when a complaint is made are increasingly becoming the ones that customers turn away from as their need for grace in these times is becoming more pressing.
Times are changing. Customers, now more than ever, know their rights as a consumer and the means for obtaining redress when things go wrong. Complaints are being reframed. No longer the bane of an organisation, best practice complaints handling is delivering a competitive edge from a deeper understanding of customer insights.
Civica’s key solutions to complaint management in 2023
Those organisations that deployed the very best complaint management solutions are able to capture customer issues where they are received. Automatically updating the customer with an instant acknowledgment outlining the process and timeline for resolution are reigning.
Like customers, organisations have high expectations when it comes to complaints management. The valuable feedback received can be used for analysing trends and ultimately delivering business intelligence. Overall, this will help organisations improve their products and services.
In the latest Civica guide, they discuss the best practices for successful complaints management. Here are some of their solutions outlined in the report:
- Deploying the best complaints management software solution is the easiest way to mitigate risk and comply with complaints handling rules and reporting requirements for your sector. Make sure the solution is best for your specific sector. Choices for these solutions include an on-premise self-managed infrastructure, a hosted cloud platform or a hybrid of the two.
- Omnichannel complaints management solution can capture and organise complaints in structure frameworks.
- Complaints management can be automated to let staff focus on personalised and fair outcomes for the customer.
Civica can help streamline your case and complaints management with their leading cloud solution Civica Case Management, powered by iCasework.