Table of Contents

11 Best Practices To Handle Customer Complaints Like A Pro!

Shopify Support

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut elit tellus, luctus nec ullamcorper mattis, pulvinar dapibus leo.

Every business wants to keep its customers happy. To do that you need to know how to resolve a customer complaint.

Do you know that 13% of customers share a negative experience with 15 or more people? On the contrary, 72% of users tell 6 or more people if they are satisfied.

causes for customer service frustration

So by handling complaints you can let a consumer share a positive experience with other people. The result is gaining the trust of customers and improving your business performance. 

That is why we are here to give you tips and break down some pointers so that you can more effectively and efficiently know how to deal with customer complaints. Hopefully, by the end of this article, you can resolve consumer complaints like a pro.

How to handle a customer complaint?

You can handle consumer grievances by employing the practices that we are going to mention. But before we do that let me ask you a question.

Have you heard of Service Recovery Paradox (SPR)? It is a situation where the customer thinks highly of a business after it resolves a complaint with its service. In SPR, correcting a problem increases confidence and assurance in the consumers.

So, without any delay let’s dive in to boost your sales by learning how to handle customer complaints.

1. Acknowledge the complaint

It is pretty straightforward and by no means unimportant. In this step, you just need to own your mistake.

  1. First, admit the mistake and be understanding. There’s is no point in getting frustrated. 
  2. Be calm. Empathize with them and provide the solution.
  3. Offer explanations without sounding defensive.

While dealing with customer complaints, you can use phrases like:

  • Normally, this should not be happening. So, I would be happy to look into it.
  • Sorry to hear that, can you please give me some time so I can look into the problem with the technical team?
  • Sorry, there seems to be miscommunication. Let me update the status so you can check it out.

2. Identify the type of customer

Handling customer service complaints may become easier if you know who you are dealing with. Here, we have types of customers to better understand them. So, you know how to deal with their grievances.

  1. Valid complainersThey are the ones who have a valid reason to complain. Here, the company is the one that did something wrong. So you have to find a way to resolve it.
  2. Pessimist complainer – This is the user who will not be happy no matter what you do to handle the complaint. So, don’t get frustrated and do your best to not disappoint the user.
  3. Competitor complainer – These are the people who just deliver fake complaints that have inaccurate details. They are not here to resolve the issue. So, just be polite and explain to them about your services.
  4. Troll complainer – These are the people who just troll the company for publicity. Most of them complain about your services on social media sites. If their complaints are valid, just offer the solution.

3. Listen before responding to customer grievances

Customer complaints are their expression of annoyance about certain things involving a company such as a defective product or service. You have to make sure to listen to them and repeat the customer service complaint to reassure them. Let them know that you are working towards it and will resolve the grievance as soon as possible.

4. Ask the right questions

Quite often the customer comes to you with a general inquiry or question.

Let’s consider one of the customer complaints examples

Imagine they ask you:

“I am trying to track my order status on your website, but I can’t find it”

 “The layout of your webpage is confusing.”

Generally, you just answer the question and ignore the complaint. This is not a good idea.

What you need to remember is that there are companies that pay money to know what is wrong with their product. Here, the customer is taking the time to give you their feedback and tell you what’s wrong, without any cost.

You just need to take the time to understand the complaint in order to resolve it.

So, ask the customer –

ask the customer

5. Provide the best possible solution

To satisfy your customers and make them happy, you need to provide the best possible solution.

Let me tell you my personal experience as an example of customer complaint and resolution:

“I ordered a Oneplus smartphone on amazon and it was supposed to be delivered on 21st January. But the product was not delivered on time. So, I called the service center and asked for a solution. Apparently, there was a delivery problem. So, they provided a cashback for the delay and re-ordered the product for me.

With this solution, they made me feel valued and increased my trust.”

Such resolving customer complaints examples tell us that providing the best solution could build confidence with the users.

6. Go the extra mile

After handling complaints, make users feel special by taking a step further in customer relationships. 

You can create a positive experience for them by doing any of the following:

  • Offer cash back, discounts for the next purchase,
  • Provide gift coupons, freebies,
  • Send handwritten notes or a thank you video and
  • Send them personalized newsletters with tips & advice.

7. Identify and resolve common customer complaints

If you got one complaint from one consumer about a specific issue over the last 10 years, then it might not be worth addressing. But if you are getting multiple messages from different users about the same issue, then it might be a problem.

To identify and resolve such high-volume complaints, you need to employ a system for tracking them. One such example of a customer complaint and resolution system is “Saufter”.

8. Create help centers

One of the best ways to resolve complaints that are repeatedly asked is to create help centers. You can provide answers to common questions about your products or services.

Here are some things you can consider when creating a help center:

  • A help center should be easy to access.
  • It should have a search bar allowing users to find the answers to questions they are looking for.
  • It should be well-structured and easy to navigate, allowing the customers to help themselves easily and quickly.

FAQ example

Note that a well-designed help center can resolve many common queries that a company receives, reducing the customer service workload.

9. Offer omnichannel support as customers move across channels

Let me tell you one of the examples of customer complaints and solutions provided by a bank:

“An IT consultant did not get his problem resolved even after complaining about it multiple times to the respective bank. After getting a suggestion from his friend, he posted his grievance on Twitter. To his surprise, the bank responded quickly and provided a resolution.”

In the above example of customer complaint and resolution, the bank employed a process to track customer complaints on different platforms. Because of the integrated support system, they were able to identify and resolve the user complaint.

You can use a good customer support system like Saufter to avoid repeating the problem every time the consumer has to interact with different operators on different platforms.

10. Use the Right Customer Support Tool to Address Complaints

In order to boost your customer experience, you need to use the right support tools.

Let’s learn about tools that are useful to any business.

  • Desktop support system – Its main function is to provide contact between customers and your support team. Here, you can log customer problems and take the necessary steps to resolve those complaints.
  • IT service management – It includes policies, and processes to implement, improve, manage and support customer-related services. Examples of customer complaints and solutions systems are COBIT, Six Sigma, ITIL, and so on.
  • Listening tools – Sometimes customers address their grievances on social media, websites, blogs, etc. So, you need tools like Hootsuite for monitoring complaints where your business is mentioned so that you can quickly address the issues.

Bonus Tip: Outsource Customer Service!

Outsourcing is about deligating customer support to experts and providing the best possible service to fulfill customer needs. In this, you will employ a third-party vendor for taking care of your customer-related services.

For instance, when you get Helplama’s fully managed customer support system, you get phone, email, live chat, and telemarketing services. 

It provides domain experts to serve your consumers on behalf of your business for handling complaints. They do this by managing inbound, and outbound calls and any non-verbal communication with users.

Note that Helplama offers both expert agents and automation services with AI.

Why Outsource? There are many reasons:

  • Cost-Effective compared to an in-house service center.
  • A strong recruitment process that small businesses find hard to establish.
  • Focus on your core management and development tasks.
  • 24/7 customer service.
  • Up-to-date technology and security.

Conclusion

After reading this article you will know how to deal with customer complaints. To be concise, you should:

  • Acknowledge the complaints, 
  • Identify the type of customer you are dealing with, 
  • Listen carefully to what the customer has to say,
  • Ask the right question to offer the best possible solution,
  • Go the extra mile to make customers happy,
  • Track consumer grievances on different platforms and resolve common user complaints by creating help centers.
  • Finally, for providing the best service, employ the right customer support tools. You can also outsource customer service.

In case you have any doubts about how to handle customer complaints, reach out to us!

Automate

Customer Support​

Automate Decisions

Group 6342@2x
Refunds
Group 6342@2x
Order delay monitoring
Group 6342@2x
Subscription modifications
Group 6342@2x
Missing orders
Group 6342@2x
Subscription cancellations
Group 6342@2x
Much more
Claim Your 6 Months Of FREE Credits Now

Automate
Customer Service

Group 6342@2x
Refunds
Group 6342@2x
Order delay monitoring
Group 6342@2x
Missing orders
Group 6342@2x
Much more
Claim Your 6 Months Of FREE Credits Now

AUTOMATE CUSTOMER SERVICE AND REDUCE REFUNDS

Claim Your 6 months of FREE Credits Now!

Get the code. Use anytime in the next 6 months.

Helplama Helpdesk is now Saufter.io!