News: Customer Service/Care
Customer service training: Complaints to the FOS rising
20 February 2009
A fall in customer service provision is leading to more complaints being registered with a leading agency, it asserts.
Walter Merricks, the chief ombudsman with the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), claims the rise is due to poor handling of consumer complaints.
He states poor customer service is leading to an increase in the number of issues being lodged for it, with their predictions for 2009 being revised from 90,000 to 150,000.
"It is clear that the rise is attributable in part to stressed businesses rejecting complaints they would previously have taken more care to investigate - and might have settled," he adds.
Mr Merricks warns that there will an increase in the number of levis being made by the Financial Services Authority and the Financial Services Compensation Scheme and suggests that with stronger customer service and complaint skills these could be minimised.
Cisco's Customer Kings 2009 survey recently found 61 per cent of businesses believe they could improve with customer service training.
