The phone rings. A customer service representative answers the phone and hears about a problem a customer is having.
It may be the first time the company hears about this particular problem, but it isn’t when the problem occurred. It occurred before the customer called. The big question is… how long before the customer called did the problem occur? Maybe it happened two minutes ago—or maybe it was two days ago. Regardless, the customer called at that moment and the customer service rep has no idea, unless they ask, when the problem occurred. This gap in time is out of the company’s control—it is the customer’s decision when to reach out.
If a customer is upset about the problem, regardless of how recent it is, you must immediately eliminate the customer’s pain from the moment they attempt to make contact with you. That was a big point my friend, Ralph Dandrea of
