Posted By: Chriskal
How to treat, and not to treat, your customers - 11/18/2015 08:58 PM
We just arrived home from our trip a day ago and will eventually put together a more complete report. However, I thought I would contrast two tales of how customer service should be done in light of recent events related, at least tangentially, to the trip.
THE BAD - we stayed overnight in STT at the Marriott Frenchman's Cove. A beautiful two bedroom villa. All in all the place was pretty dang nice and for the most part a good experience. Other than the staff members that behaved as if they were ready to physically remove us from the room when it was time to go.
The morning of check out we got up relaxed on the balcony for a bit and went down for the $20+ breakfast buffet as it was the only option available onsite. Whatever, no big deal. We got back to the room about 10 and started packing. 5 minutes later someone is pounding, and I mean pounding on the door. I answer it and an aggressively rude man, without preamble or greeting barks. “don’t you know checkout is at 10:00!!” Well, no I didn’t realize that. Seems pretty damn early, but whatever. I look at my watch at it’s about 5 minutes after so I tell him we’re packing up and will be out in a 10 minutes.
Less than two minutes later (checked my watch) more pounding. Two minutes after that, more pounding. We left within the 10 I told him and as we walk out there were three staff members standing there with their arms crossed, glaring at us and generally acting like we had robbed the hotel safe.
I realize we were in the room a few minutes past official checkout. Fine. One polite knock or phone call would have been sufficient and in keeping with how you should treat guests that are paying a premium price to stay at your facility if you want them to return. I won’t be.
Rant over/
THE GREAT- I bought several Polar Bear coolers last year when they ran the 2 for 1 sale. Towards the end of the summer my backpack cooler started to leak a bit around the bottom straps. Not severe, just kind of made the bottom of the cooler very damp and would leave moisture on the floor if left out long enough.
I called them today to see if they would fix it, replace it, whatever. Super nice lady plugged my name in the computer, confirmed my address and said they would send me a new one immediately. I offered to send the old one back in, but she said to keep it and use it with icepacks or something if I could.
Amazing customer service, warranty and exactly the kind of treatment that will cause this consumer to continue purchasing from that company.
THE BAD - we stayed overnight in STT at the Marriott Frenchman's Cove. A beautiful two bedroom villa. All in all the place was pretty dang nice and for the most part a good experience. Other than the staff members that behaved as if they were ready to physically remove us from the room when it was time to go.
The morning of check out we got up relaxed on the balcony for a bit and went down for the $20+ breakfast buffet as it was the only option available onsite. Whatever, no big deal. We got back to the room about 10 and started packing. 5 minutes later someone is pounding, and I mean pounding on the door. I answer it and an aggressively rude man, without preamble or greeting barks. “don’t you know checkout is at 10:00!!” Well, no I didn’t realize that. Seems pretty damn early, but whatever. I look at my watch at it’s about 5 minutes after so I tell him we’re packing up and will be out in a 10 minutes.
Less than two minutes later (checked my watch) more pounding. Two minutes after that, more pounding. We left within the 10 I told him and as we walk out there were three staff members standing there with their arms crossed, glaring at us and generally acting like we had robbed the hotel safe.
I realize we were in the room a few minutes past official checkout. Fine. One polite knock or phone call would have been sufficient and in keeping with how you should treat guests that are paying a premium price to stay at your facility if you want them to return. I won’t be.
Rant over/
THE GREAT- I bought several Polar Bear coolers last year when they ran the 2 for 1 sale. Towards the end of the summer my backpack cooler started to leak a bit around the bottom straps. Not severe, just kind of made the bottom of the cooler very damp and would leave moisture on the floor if left out long enough.
I called them today to see if they would fix it, replace it, whatever. Super nice lady plugged my name in the computer, confirmed my address and said they would send me a new one immediately. I offered to send the old one back in, but she said to keep it and use it with icepacks or something if I could.
Amazing customer service, warranty and exactly the kind of treatment that will cause this consumer to continue purchasing from that company.