One of the prerogatives of being a fairly well read blogger – especially of a sales related blog – is that every now and then you get to rant about a bad customer service experience you’ve had.
This is my time.
And it’s a doozy.
I’ve just spent the best part of an hour being grilled by the security staff at John Lewis in what I would describe as a deliberately (policy driven) accusatory manner. I’ve been a very valuable customer for them over the years and they’ve just lost me for life.
I went to John Lewis today to buy some stuff – a solar charger for my iphone and a new wallet. For those outside the UK, John Lewis is a well known national chain of department stores – they usually have pretty good items at good prices – and they have a good reputation for customer service. They’re fairly unique in that they are owned by the 69,000 employees (or partners as they call them) and were voted Britain’s favourite retailer in 2009. Well, they’re certainly not my favourite now.
After I’d bought the solar charger I started looking at wallets. The reason I wanted a new one was that although my current one works well in a jacket pocket – it’s just too big to slip into the pocket on a pair of jeans or trousers if I’m not wearing a jacket. I wanted a nice looking one – but the main criteria was that it was small.
In order to find the right wallet I spent quite a bit of time at the stand testing them out. There were some very small ones – just big enough for a few credit cards, and some slightly bigger ones which allowed more stuff to fit in them. I took my existing credit cards and tried them in the new wallets, putting the wallets into and out of my jacket and trouser pockets to test. At one point I went to the counter to buy the very small one – then had second thoughts and tested it with some extra cards I have in my wallet and found it a very tight fit for them. So I went back to the slightly larger ones – some nice Ted Baker branded leather wallets. I “umm’d and ahh’d” for a bit over the choice of a black leather one matching most of the other stuff I carry, or a cooler brown leather one. In the end I went for the plain black leather one.
I tried to check out the prices of the wallets – but struggled to find any price tags (I later found out the tags are usually inside the wallets – I was looking on the boxes). The wallet I wanted was next to two empty boxes – one with a price in it and one without (to be honest with all the swapping and moving I have no idea which box it was originally in) – but both were Ted Baker boxes.
I put the wallet in the box with the price tag and took it to the counter. When I got served, I specifically asked the assistant to double check the price of the wallet as I wasn’t sure I had the correct box and I wanted to make sure I was paying the correct price.
He disappeared for a few minutes and then came back and confirmed the price on the box was correct – a relatively cheap £35.
So I bought it, and after fiddling with my iphone for a bit, left the store ready to head home.
Outside the door I was confronted by three big security guards. One asked me to show him what was in my pockets, which I did (I actually had the new wallet in my hands at the time and was busy transferring my credit cards into it as I walked). After confirming that, of course, I didn’t have an extra wallet anywhere, they said they still wanted to take me to the security area so I was escorted back through the store into the private room they have.
When there I told them I wanted to record the conversation we were about to have on the voice recorder app on my iphone (it would have made a fun podcast!) – they disappeared for 10 minutes and came back saying that they had been told by group security that in would be “inappropriate” to record it on a mobile phone (!?!).
They then took my name and address – and then told me that they suspected me of something called “ticket swapping”. Apparently this is where someone swaps the price tag on a high priced item for a lower priced tag.
I explained how I had been selecting my wallet and trying out sizes and that I understood it may have looked strange. I then explained how there had only been one box with a price on so I had picked that but had deliberately asked the sales assistant to confirm the correct price so that I didn’t under or over pay. I checked with them that they’d spoken to the sales assistant and confirmed this had happened.
“OK I thought, that’s that cleared up. They’re only doing their jobs – but now they understand what happened I’ll get an apology and it’ll all be over with”.
But no.
I did get an apology of sorts. The main security guard offered his apology saying “there’s been confusion and mistakes on both sides. On this occasion we’re prepared to let you leave right now.”
I did a double take. What did they mean “mistakes on both sides” and “on this occasion” – what “occasion” is this? Me buying for and paying for goods and taking extra steps to make sure I paid the right price.
So I checked with him: “Are you agreeing that you were mistaken and that I made sure I paid the correct price? Or do you still think I was up to something?”
He stated that in his view “A ticket swap was attempted – but I (the guard) intercepted this and made sure the right price was paid”.
I couldn’t believe it. I checked again. “Look, I specifically asked the assistant to check the price and make sure it was right. There’s no way I could have been trying anything. Think about it – I deliberately made sure I was paying the right price.”
But he wouldn’t back down.
“Are you still accusing me of trying to do this ‘ticket swap’ thing?”
“Yes”.
Unbelieveable. I go out of my way to make sure a mistake isn’t made – and I get accused of trying to steal something.
Well, that was it for me.
As it happens, I am absolutely scrupulous about honesty. If I get undercharged for things or get an accidental refund I will point it out and pay the right amount. The flip side of that is I am absolutely relentless if someone accuses me of dishonesty.
Despite his apologies he was not going to admit he was wrong. He was still accusing me of theft.
Obviously I called for the manager – I was furious.
To his credit, the manager listened to my story and apologised. He said all the right words – but it still hurt.
I wouldn’t leave until the security guard backed down and admitted I was clearly innocent. Maybe it’s just me but I couldn’t leave there knowing that someone – for whatever foolhardy reason – thought I was guilty of something. It just seemed so obviously wrong to me.
After they backed down I went downstairs with them just to make sure – for my own sanity – that I hadn’t been undercharged. I didn’t want to walk out of that store thinking “perhaps an accident did happen and I’ve paid less than this is worth”. And of course, the assistant confirmed I’d paid exactly the right amount. Of course I had – I’d asked him to double check originally.
The guard walked out of the store with me. (Eventually) he was apologetic. But even then I couldn’t help thinking – “Is he just saying this because it’s ‘good customer service’?” “Does he really believe he was right all along?”.
I’m still thinking that now – and I hate it. I can’t bear to think that out there someone thinks I’ve been dishonest and “got away with it”.
I’m not naming the individual security guard. I really don’t think it was specifically him. Clearly guards are trained to be suspicious – to distrust. They need to do so to do their job. My issue is with the procedures they followed.
The problem was that the whole procedure seemed designed on the assumption I was guilty. So even when
it became startlingly clear that I had in fact gone out of my way to be honest – the guard just couldn’t accept it. The words he’d been trained to use – apologising without admitting a mistake; then admitting a “partial mistake” but still claiming that I was guilty. Then trying to close the issue (by “letting me go this time”) without resolving the mental turmoil that any genuine customer would have been going through.
And what if I hadn’t gone the extra mile and asked the assistant to double check the price? What if I’d just done the perfectly reasonable act of picking the nearest box to the wallet and taking that to the checkout? Would they ever have backed down? I’d probably still be there now. I’d never have got any mental resolution to the issue of being under suspicion. And my God, it was so painful to be treated with such suspicion – that was a real revelation for me.
A simple step for them would also have been to check my name against their customer records (they had plenty of time while they were “checking with legal”). While having spent thousands with them over recent years isn’t a guarantee of my honesty – it would have told them what they had at risk, and that maybe they should proceed carefully and try to ensure that the process was as painless as possible for me.
And their procedures let them down with follow-up. When they thought I was guilty they wrote all my details down. When it became clear I wasn’t, they gave me back the sheet to prove they were keeping no records of the incident. But they have also kept no records in order to redeem themselves. They have no idea who I am or how to contact me. Now they can’t follow-up to apologise or do anything. Their much heralded John Lewis Customer Service has no chance of working.
So what have I learned from this?
Well, firstly it’s reminded me that blogging is a pretty cathartic experience. I feel rather better for having written about this. Perhaps I should have written this as a letter of complaint rather than airing their dirty laundry in public. But – bah! I’m a blogger Goddammit.
Secondly, it’s really driven home like a nail just how important customer experience is in selling.
I’ve spent literally thousands of pounds in that John Lewis store over the years. From prams for the kids when they were born, to toys, tons of electronics, some artwork and home furnishings, right through to some lamps last week. They’re a good store with good products and excellent value – I know that rationally. They have good principles – I’ve seen them, and I know people who work there and they’re lovely people. But right now I cannot imagine myself ever shopping there again. This incident has cost them many thousands of pounds (not counting the bad PR from all the people I inevitably rant to – and the people who read this).
We all talk and advise our clients about the importance of good service and making amends when something goes wrong. We all know it rationally. But you never know it fully until you experience it yourself. I’m still fuming over an hour later. My pain will be rekindled later when my wife gets home and I tell her about it. As I said, I can’t imagine ever shopping there again.
Now let’s put this in perspective: I haven’t lost a loved one, been detained illegally for years, or been beaten for being somewhere in the vicinity of a protest march. I’ve just had a bad experience. But it shows how something as rationally small as this can have such a huge emotional impact on customers.
Finally, it’s highlighted the importance of making sure you have a way of making amends properly. They let me walk out of that store with no way of contacting me again. Now sure, I might not have wanted to give them my details – but they didn’t ask. As it happens, even requesting my details so they could follow up, perhaps do a “post mortem”, would have made me feel better. What I really want is for them to review their policies so that innocent customers aren’t made to feel like criminals like I was. But I’ll never know if that’s happening and they have no way of telling me if it is.
Well, rant over. Thanks for staying with me. Hopefully we learnt a little along the way about how to treat customers and how to make sure you have an avenue for making amends.
If you have a similar painful story to share – drop it in the comments below – it might help you feel better!
Ian
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Ian
You are definitely guilty… of writing a long post… I think you have even surpassed my longest efforts!
I have written posts on a couple of customer experiences that should not have happened and can fully understand your frustration. Just last week I also encountered another bad experience and this was with Acer – I was going to blog about it, but decided not to because of time.
It seems to me that in this economic climate, when customer service should be at its best, seems to be actually getting worse. Does anyone else feel the same? Perhaps people are under more pressure due to the economy – less staff, threat of losing ones job, making sales, etc… and this is then taken out on the customer?
Good blog. Want a couple places to post this? Go to http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/1355087 for a LinkedIn group called Kudos and Katastrophes, and go to http://tinyurl.com/kudoskatastrophes for the same facebook group!
Companies need to see how much money mistakes like this can cost them!!!
“Never Knowingly Undersold”
Doesn’t that familiar old tagline take on a rather unfortunate meaning with this incident?
If you’re incensed to the point of blogging about it perhaps the procedure the security officer was labouring under could be handled with by a few simple and thoughtful words, something like: “Sir, whilst we’ll be asking you some questions about what we observed involving your acquisition of items from our store, we work on a basis of innocent before proven guilty and at no point will we attempt to draw any conclusion until all the facts are established”
@Shaun Gisbourne – Shaun – I think that would have helped – but only if they actually meant it. You could just tell that he’d drawn his conclusions already and when the facts didn’t fit them he ignored the facts.
As it happened, he bold-facedly told me I was guilty. He tried to weasel-word around it initially – “we’ll let you off” but when challenged he admitted it. Multiple times. Despite all the evidence and sheer logic that I couldn’t possible by trying to cheat a lower price because I’d asked the assitant to confirm and make sure the price was right.
Ian
Ian, I think you hit the nail on the head when you fingered the process and procedures, and the training that supported a prejudice of guilt. That root cause was exacerbated by something more sinister that, like inflexible process, I see all the time, but more often lately: The inability to accept responsibility.
“We’ll let you off this time” is such a cop-out (pun intended, since you were dealing with rent-a-cops at the time). Not only are front-line employees unwilling to accept your perspective, but they are so combative that they cannot accept the slimmest of chances that they are wrong.
In essence, John Lewis had the opportunity to get a ton of free consulting from you, as you were willing and able to provide clarity to its unclear process. Rather than taking your input and implementing positive change, however, the ambassadors of John Lewis diligently rebuffed your civility and created a Loyal Lost Customer. Here is audio of my explanation and discussion of the concept of a “Loyal Lost Customer” http://www.box.net/shared/rivbmz78sb
Hi,
The thing that struck me whilst reading (and then re reading) your post was that although the manager apologised and the guard eventually apologised you still don’t believe that the apology was genuine.
Sure you’ve been treated unfairly (from what i can tell) however you cant change other people, it’s a law that is universal. we cant change other people we can only change ourself (or our outlook aka frame / persepctive).
Imagine how this story would have read if the frame through which you viewed it had allowed you to believe that the guard was being honest in his apology on your departure (perhaps a revelation that he’d got it wrong).
I think you should write to them and perhaps even make John Lewis an offer regarding some free training in “sales excellence” now that would be remarkable. take the moral high ground and get some great PR out of it and enlighten them too
take care
mike
I never ever post but this time I will,Thanks alot for the great blog
Wow, unbelievable story. I really can’t believe the security guards attitude. He spoke to the sales person you talked to and he still wanted to accuse you of ticket swapping? I think for whatever reason he was too prideful to apologize because he obviously made a huge mistake and was unwilling to admit it.
Hi Ian,
Love the post and the blog. It is particularly interesting because of the mantra of the organisation in question – that all their staff are part owners, so everyone has a vested interest in driving an excellent customer experience. Evidently, this does not extend to the security staff!
It is an odd co-incidence for me as I am trying to collate sales stories (of which this pretty much is, just from the other perspective) on http://www.theproductiveseller.com. If you or anyone reading this has any to share, I would be really grateful. Click http://bit.ly/7hx0Y and add it to the comments section. I will be picking the best ones to include in a special post later in the year.
Feel free to promote yourself and your blog in the final paragraph of anything you post.
Cheers,
Mike.
I think it could partially have been pride Stefanie – but I also got the feeling that it was partially some sort of “psychological blindness”. he had convinced himself I was guilty so he just filtered out all the evidence to the contrary.
Ian
Don’t buy a TV from them thinking the 5 year guarantee is good, because it isn’t. I’ve had three replacement TV’s in eighteen months and I’ve had to shell out extra money every time. Plus, no price promise against richer sounds or tesco ‘because they are not high street retailers!’
I’m a partner (legally just an employee of course) in the John Lewis business and I couldn’t agree more with your sentiment here. As much as it is a shame to lose your business, from a human point of view it’s entirely understandable. I’m glad though that you didn’t fall for the old trap that many do in your situation and explicitly state the everything about [offending business] is terrible and all employees of [offending business] are truly awful.
I am writing this because I have had a bad experience with John Lewis, and I must admit, I feel helpless and I would like to make a formal complaint, but I’m not sure to whom, or where.
First of all, my story is nothing compared to Ian’s, but it is another testatment of really bad customer service from JL.
This is to do with an order of curtains. I went to the JS store to make an order and amend some of the measurements that had been made of a set of curtains. An extremely disagreable woman started saying that I had to pay, again, £50 (this is what they charge to come to your home and take measurements) as this would be a new set of measurements. I can’t explain what it was but it was her attitude especially when I tried challenging her rationale for charging me £50. In the end, a very nice young man came along and served me, extremely well. He double checked and said that I shouldnt be charged £50. All well, I place my order, for curtains in two rooms of the house.
I receive the estimate, and it was so high, that my partner and I decided to get only one set of curtains done. So we go to the store and ask them to produce the relevant paperwork and sign it. A few days later, after thinking about it more, we decide that maybe we should also go ahead with the second room, and we went to the store and signed the paperwork again.
We sorted all this out very quickly, as we needed the curtains. These were blackout and we couldn’t get much sleep with the summer light. After over 10 days, we get another estimate asking us to sign the paperwork. To my amazement, it turned out that no orders had been placed. I phone the store, and spend some utterly useless time talking to someone who said she would call me back but she never did.
I go then to the store the next day, and after waiting good 10 minutes of phone conversation between a member of staff and the workroom (where all the paperwork is sorted out), I am told that I made some changes to the order and thus I would have to sign the forms again. I explain that the order hadnot been changed, and that we had not been told that we would get a new set of estimates. This means an extra 3 weeks, when we thought the orders had been processed. The extremely unpleasant lady accused me, in the end, of making changes to my order, which I didn’t, and also of not being able to identify who had served me when I had signed the paperwork (thus assuming that I was lying?). I left very upset. I always think that if I had had such customer I wouldnt treat them in such an unpleasant way. JLs burecraucy has been particulary bad, and all the delays we have had after taking time off to sign all the paperwork in two different occasions. I just can’t understand the attitude. Surely they are there to be helpful, and try and resolve matters quickly? ?
sorry for this long blog, I hope I made sense??, and thanks for reading all this. If anyone could let me know where I can make a complaint about rude behaviour from staff at JLs please let me know.
Ugh.
Sounds very painful indeed Joyce.
I believe John Lewis themselves are going through some very painful changes at the moment – cost cutting, redefinition of roles, outsourcing etc. And I believe morale is pretty low amongst staff – so perhaps that might have something to do with it.
I’m afraid I don’t know where you coudl write to complain. I’ve only written one letter of complaint in my life before, to bank. I just looke don their website for the board member/director responsible for customer service tpe things and wrote to him. He (or more likely his PA) passed my letter on to their customer service team. You could try that.
Cheers,
Ian
Ian
I have had worse, but this was at House of Fraser. I visited their Manchester store on a Saturday afternoon. As soon as I entered the store, things just went wild. I walked past the secuiryt guard standing next to the main door. He radioed his colleagues and within a couple of minutes I had 5 security guards following me around the store. One of them even tried to predict where I was going. This lasted for about half an hour until I took my purchases to the till and paid for them. The security guards (working for AFC Group Security) then just left me on my own. I complained to the manager who told me that it was House of Fraser policy to have their contractors (in this case AFC Group Security) deal directly with their customers. They promised a thorough investigation. It took a month for AFC Group Security to get back to me stating that I had lied and that I have made up the whole incident. I then requested to have a copy of the CCTV tapes. Well, I was told that they had been wiped! I then complained to the board of directors of House of Fraser. I eventually got an apology from their company secretary stating that they had failed me as a customer. But he could not help criticising me either, writing that he could not understand why hadn’t complained earlier to him!
Joyce,
I sympathise, having just experienced John Lewis’ “customer service”. If I were you, I would complain by letter or email to the CEO. I’ve done this a couple of times in the past with Sky, Abbey National (they lost some legal documents of ours and then lied about it – appalling service) and Sony. You should be able to find the CEO’s name and email on the web.
I sympathise with John Lewis staff if they are being restructured, but don’t think that’s any excuse for rude and bullying behaviour. Everyone (including me) is at risk of redundancy or is being restructured so it’s not as if they are the only ones. Perhaps they should do a couple of night shifts in the NHS to learn how to deal with people – when I worked in the NHS we had to be polite and caring at all times, including on night duty and in the face of violent and abusive patients and relatives.
My issue with John Lewis is that they refused point blank to give me a refund after an item I ordered over the net arrived damaged. I gave in because I doubted myself, but next time I have an issue about damaged goods in any shop, I will take the Sale of Goods Act with me and show it to them. I’m afraid John Lewis have lost me as a customer – being bullied into accepting an exchange rather than being refunded does not make me a happy customer. I get better service on ebay.
If you live in a flat DO NOT BOTHER trying to buy a range cooker from John Lewis. After ordering over a month ago, ringing them every few days to chase , we have been told they wont deliver because they have to carry the oven up 13 stairs. They even suggested that my father, who is 81, help the delivery guys. Unfortunately, I’m not a guy – or a woman with large muscles – so couldn’t offer to carry it anyway – not that its our job, we are the customers! Disgusting service – especially as our home is kitted put with everything from John Lewis. WILL NEVER SHOP WITH THEM AGAIN!
I would like to know who is the best person/company to put in a formal complaint against the store and their complete lack of help.
Just a few things:
You did mess with the wallets for a good while (cards in, cards out, into pockets, out of pockets). The guy on the cam will have been watching you and thinking ‘what the…’. I would have grabbed an assistant and had them try out the wallets with you from the start just to avoid looking suspicious.
Second, security guards aren’t the brightest sparks. You have to do the above just to be on the safe side. They assume guilt.
Third, Ted Baker wallets are a lot cheaper in TK Maxx, and the staff are not as vociferous. £35 isn’t cheap. £20 is nearer the mark.
Fourth, you mentioned that nobody at JL knows who you are, what you’ve been though, etc. Just put the above blog (edited version) into a letter to the head office, or post a link to this page onto their Facebook and Twitter pages. Adept social media officers will leap onto your complaint and address it swiftly. In the days before blogs or even the ‘net, you would have written to head office as your first recourse, rather than making the whole experience public.
Appreciate your comments Justin – but think you’ve missed the point a bit.
This isn’t a post about what I could have done differently. I’m sure there’s always things I could improve on.
This was a post (mainly a rant) about how a company renowned for its customer service screwed up badly. And it’s also a lesson for readers on how not to do customer service.
So yes, I could have tried to avoid looking suspicious. But I shouldn’t have to. (And, frankly, would a real shoplifter put wallets repeatedly in and out of his pocket in full view of a camera? Or would he more likely sneak something in quietly?)
And do I really have to expect the worst from security guards? Are they somehow a different breed from all the other staff who go through customer service training? Do they have to suspect everyone? I don’t think so.
And yes, TK Maxx may be cheaper for wallets. But that’s irrelevant for this story about John Lewis customer service.
And, of course, I could have written them a letter. But again, that’s not the point. The point is that they could easily have found out who I was at the time by checking their records. And when I left, they could easily have followed up to apologise – but they didn’t.
The only follow up I got was 18 months later when a John Lewis PR person spotted the story was being retweeted and emailed to ask if they could do anything. When I said no, it was too late, they were happy to let it drop (as opposed to someone who really cared about cutomer service and would want to make it right anyway).
Ian
I dislike ranting Ian and JL is my shop of choice. Over the years they have given me outstanding service so am prepared to admit to bias. Was there no other way? If you had been in charge of training, client care, what would you have put in place?
Do you really want to give up after all in your own words, “They’re a good store with good products and excellent value – I know that rationally. They have good principles – I’ve seen them, and I know people who work there and they’re lovely people.”
You know, we all make mistakes…
Ever Positive,
Eilidh
Eilidh Milnes recently posted..The Excuse Cycle