Large Electrical Appliances Essays

Large Electrical Appliances Essays Large Electrical Appliances Essay Large Electrical Appliances Essay John Lewis offers a second year free on all White Goods. This is one of the extra services that distinguishes John Lewis above other stores. This was something that was decided centrally and is offered by all Large Electrical departments in all stores in the partnership.  When customers come into the department it is usually for two reasons. They are the high level of service that they have become accustomed to and the free two-year guarantee that is offered. The guarantee covers a number of things including accidental damage, loss of frozen food, and mechanical failure with an appliance. The guarantee starts from the date of purchase, which is where we have problems with customers. Delivery is never possible on the same day the order is placed and many customers question the fact that they are losing out on time of the Two year guarantee. Unfortunately there is no way around this problem. The Customer Service Manager is trained to deal with complaint and explains to the customer that the problem lies with the insurance company John Lewis uses, Landmark as that is the date that is printed on the bill. Changes with this could be made to print the delivery date on the bill. I have been assured by the manager of the Large Electrical that this is a point that has been raised at Head Office. He also said that customers do leave the department after having brought up the point as the CSM point out that they do have the customers best interest at heart as they offer the extra years guarantee in the first place. I was also told that the CSM explains to the customer, if a problem arose with the machine in the time gap that isnt covered in the two years something can usually be worked out with the customer. These are just a few examples of how Customer service strategies are used in the Large Electrical Department to ensue that customers are happy with the service that they receive from John Lewis. They also highlight that even with these strategies there are problems that need to be addressed for perfect customer services.  These new strategies in the department have helped the department to meet its own objective in a number of ways. The Large Electrical Department has set a number of its own objectives so that is has its own targets to meet. These objectives are:- To provide an efficient service to our customers  To provide a reliable service to our customers  To provide a knowledgeable service to our customers  The Ticketing System  The new ticketing system has proved to be very successful with both the customers and the Selling Partners in the department. This has been noticed by the Customer Service Manager from comments he has received from customers after having been served in the department. Comments from the Partners show that they also like the system as they feel that it is less stressful as the department is more orderly. This system helps the department to run more efficiently as it is clear exactly who is the next customer to be served. It also means that the right Partners with the correct knowledge serve the correct people.  This does however raise the question of why dont all the partners have the full extensive knowledge on all the products and systems in the department. This is one of the Partnerships objectives and by showing that staff arent able to deal with all the customers that come into the department. Customer care is good as the Customer Service Manager links the suitable Selling Partner to the customer. This would be even better if all staff were able to deal with the customers. This makes it clear that not all the employees have the thorough training stated in the Partnerships aims. This is a point that needs to looked into to improve performance.  Telesales  As with the ticketing system the introduction of the telesales department has been a major success and has relieved the Large Electrical Department of some of the pressure that can build up during busy times. This new initiative has meant that the department is making more money as more sales are being made because staff in the shop can deal with a larger percentage of people that come into the department rather than some customers walking off because they cant get served. The telesales team can also deal with a large number of people. The new telesales also means that John Lewis has entered a new market, the home shopping market, making John Lewis services available to more people. Such people include professionals who dont have time to go out on shopping trip because of the busy lives they lead. As noted earlier there are some areas where changes need to be made in order for Telesales to run more effectively for the Large Electrical Department. Telesales Partners should also be trained in product knowledge instead of just systems training. At the moment staff on Telesales are able to place orders for customers but cant actually advise and help the customer choose what appliance is best suited for them. Once again this brings up the question of why arent partners being trained to multi task? By allowing this sort of training the partnerships aims would be met more effectively.  Computerised Ordering System  So far in the time that the computerised ordering system has been in operation there havent been any major problems with Partners getting to grip with the system as it is a fairly user friendly. The name of the system is Customer Service Net and it provides just that, good customer services. The customer can see exactly what is being done for instance the information that the partner puts into the system as the order is being placed. This minimizes the chance of mistakes being made which were fairly common with the old ordering format. It also means that delivery areas have become much wider for the branch as the Large Electrical Department can delivery the goods via other branches using the system. This has helped the department meet another of the objectives that the Partnership has set.  The amount of paperwork has also decreased so after the customer has left the department the selling partner can move straight onto serving the next customer. This means that customers arent waiting as long to be served, and are happy as the whole process of buying goods from this department is easier.