It’s been another great start to the year for one of the stalwarts of British retail, The Co-Op, which won two titles at the 2018 UK Complaint Handling Awards.
Following Co-Op Food winning the Dispute Resolution Professional title at the 2017 event, the firm was represented again at this year’s bash in London’s Park Plaza Riverbank venue, with successful entries in the Best Contact Centre and Product Service Improvement – Transforming Customer Care categories.
The story of how Head of Customer Services, Claire Carroll, took over two under-performing Co-Op call centres in 2015 and transformed them into a major success story has been well documented, and in 2016/17, this successful strategy was expanded to improve standards on a wider basis.
Among the initiatives that impressed judges in both categories this year this year was a bespoke programme of resilience training to help staff morale cope in the face of difficult conversations with customers, and the introduction of goodwill gestures for complainants who are Co-Op members.
As a result of this, 35 percent of non-member complainants joined as members as part of the resolution of their complaint.
A Co-Op spokesperson explained:
“Our approach has been joined up from the start, with a strategy that clearly calls out the value opportunity for insight and quantifies the benefits to the business of great customer service. As a result of relentlessly following these two opportunities, we have now positioned the contact centre as a strategic asset which helps retain thousands of valuable customers who are at risk and shapes the in-store offer to attract and retain millions more.”
Meanwhile, hot on the heels of Co-Op in both categories was double Silver winners CrossCountry.