How to manage complaint handling more cleverly

Current crises like the Covid-19-pandemic, the war in Ukraine as well as geopolitical developments and climate change are causing a lot of companies immense problems in the production of goods and services. Thus, ever more customers are disappointed, with the resulting complaints at a record high. Even though clients and sales partners are at times understanding in terms of the companies’ problems in view of the current situation, significantly higher expectations regarding the complaint processing can be observed. A quick response time as well as a customised and adequate solution are part of these growing expectations. Moreover, the number of channels/ media through which customers and sales partners express their dissatisfaction and of which quick response times (e.g. for Facebook comments, Amazon and Google reviews) are expected has risen. Oftentimes, customers use several channels/ media for the same complaint, which also entails additional work for the company.

In order to still positively surprise clients and sales partners in case of a complaint, companies need to be prepared to process significantly more complaints faster and with a higher level of quality whilst commanding a variety of classic and digital channels. This challenge cannot be mastered only through ever more human resources in the complaint processing, not least because such employees are very scarce on the labour market, leading to a noticeable rise in the costs of complaint processing. Therefore, complaint processes need to be rethought and designed more smartly. By doing so, the opportunities from digitalisation are to be exploited as fully as possible.

How do you get a grip on your barrage of complaints?

In times of an increasing number of incoming complaints and resulting backlogs, it is essential to keep calm even if the topic is on the agenda of top management conferences expecting quick results, as is currently the case with a lot of companies.

A precondition for an efficient complaint processing is that the incoming complaints are sorted into defined categories. The categorisation can occur either manually through employees or through clients/ sales partners taking care of the allocation themselves, e.g. via a digital complaint form. It is even more effective if an automated categorisation of the incoming complaints is made possible through keywords, for example. On the one hand, a categorisation of complaints is beneficial in that the employees can process the same/ similar complaints significantly faster/ more repetitively than constantly changing topics. On the other hand, a categorisation can be used to prioritize urgent issues. As a result, such problems can be dealt with early on, even in times of a particularly high number of incoming complaints.

Furthermore, the categorisation provides an important backbone in case casual employees or external service providers are to get involved flexibly in the complaint processing. While the internal employees are then able to focus on working with rather complex complaint categories, casual employees and service providers are able to comprehensively process simple categories already after a short instruction.

Apart from the categorisation, the complaint process should be reviewed as a whole with regard to its automation potential. The following aspects comprise a choice of possible starting points:

• Enterprises provide clients/ sales partners with a digital complaint form in which all relevant information (possibly depending on the complaint category) are included. The input is validated automatically if possible (e.g. the existence of the stated client/ item number). As a result, the likelihood of an employee processing a case quickly and comprehensively increases
• Customers/ sales partners can inform themselves on their own via a portal about the status of their complaint including the expected processing time
• Complaints coming in multiple times as well as follow-up complaints are recognized automatically and conflated
• Incoming complaints are complemented automatically by additional information. One can, for instance, determine by the client/ case number how important the client/ case is with regard to a possible prioritisation
• For certain complaint categories, a written reply is suggested to the employee based on similar cases

It is advisable to implement automation approaches step by step. Thus, one can evaluate after every implementation phase if these approaches have led to advantages for the company, the employees and the customers/ sales partners. With growing experience in automation, one can aim for a completely automated processing of certain complaint categories.

Apart from the automation efforts, a professional complaint management should always seek to support the company in categorically avoiding as well as considerably reducing complaints. The prerequisite for that is a comprehensive complaint reporting illustrating what customers/ sales partners complain about, who/ what caused the complaints and through which measures complaints can be avoided completely or to a significant degree. If a proposed measure is implemented, the success of the measure can be reviewed as part of the reporting. One can, for instance, evaluate whether an optimisation of the packing has led to a noticeable decrease in complaints about damaged goods following the dispatch.

Conclusion

Usually, the topic of complaint management is merely a side issue in high-level circles of decision-making. The current relevance of the topic in many enterprises provides a suitable foundation for rethinking complaint processes and receiving permission for the investments required. Through such a project, costs can be saved fairly soon, internal employees can be relieved of their workload and the chance of a customer-focused complaint processing can be taken advantage of.