2 examples how companies lose prospective customers:
Example 1: Hertz car rental company, New Delhi
Me: (on phone) Hello Hertz, tomorrow morning 4 AM I need an airport transfer-From a hotel near Nizamuddin to Domestic airport. If that’s possible for you give me a quote.
Hertz Rep: Its certainly possible sir, can I have your number please…
Me: You don’t have a caller ID? It is 98xxx xxxxx.
Hertz: You’re Mr. Shrinidhi Hande right? (See they’re smart enough to store my details- I'd taken their car on self drive earlier)
Me: yes, now can you give me a quote for say Indica?
Hertz: We charge from Garage to garage sir, for 4 hours/40 kms Indica will be 550 Rs sir, in your case I guess it will be more than 55 kms sir, interstate taxes and tolls extra.
Me: I’m not going out of NCR of Delhi and I don’t know where is your garage-I’ve told you the pickup point and destination, which are around 15 kms apart, do your calculation and give me a rate.
Hertz: No sir, I’ll try to send a cab from our garage in place A (I forgot the name), if not possible I’ll have to send one from Place B sir.
Me: Enough. I’ll call you back. Thanks.
Hertz was rated best car rental company recently (by whom? I forgot :(-just remember reading somewhere). Wondering why they are so insensitive to customer needs, despite being so expensive. I’ve told them the pickup point and destination. I understand there’ll be some dry kms (where cab has to travel empty before picking me and after dropping me), but as a customer I have no idea where their garage is located and where the driver will go after dropping me. if they have a garage some 100 kms away, certainly I’m not going to pay for their garage to garage travel. Most of the call taxis and meter taxis start the meters after we board the vehicle, prepaid taxis ask for a fixed amount based on the destination, but traditional full service car rental agencies still insist on garage to garage charges, which might work well with corporates they deal with, but an individual may not always be comfortable with this scheme, mainly when they can't even give an estimate and expect me to blindly agree to whatever garage to garage time/km they claim. Why don’t they give a fixed quote keeping some provision for these dry kms?
Anyway, I pursued my journey in a cab arranged by hotel for Rs 350. Hertz would have charged atleast twice for the same service, under their garage to garage policy.
Example 2: HSBC Bank
HSBC direct selling agents had setup a tent in front of my place of work. I approached them, asking if I can open a savings bank account with them. The person went on explaining something like this: “Take this account sir, it’s very useful-you’ll get overdrafts which you can use for various things-interest is very low sir, just 1% per day”
Me: I don’t want to pay interest and not interested in overdrafts. Do you have a basic savings bank account where I can keep money and collect interest?
HSBC person: “Why sir, overdrafts are very useful no sir? Apply sir…”
Me: bye bye.
I’m sure SB account was part of powerVantage account and using overdraft facility is not mandatory. But this rep was not able to explain other advantages and was doing blah blah regarding overdrafts, turning a prospect off.
Example 1: Hertz car rental company, New Delhi
Me: (on phone) Hello Hertz, tomorrow morning 4 AM I need an airport transfer-From a hotel near Nizamuddin to Domestic airport. If that’s possible for you give me a quote.
Hertz Rep: Its certainly possible sir, can I have your number please…
Me: You don’t have a caller ID? It is 98xxx xxxxx.
Hertz: You’re Mr. Shrinidhi Hande right? (See they’re smart enough to store my details- I'd taken their car on self drive earlier)
Me: yes, now can you give me a quote for say Indica?
Hertz: We charge from Garage to garage sir, for 4 hours/40 kms Indica will be 550 Rs sir, in your case I guess it will be more than 55 kms sir, interstate taxes and tolls extra.
Me: I’m not going out of NCR of Delhi and I don’t know where is your garage-I’ve told you the pickup point and destination, which are around 15 kms apart, do your calculation and give me a rate.
Hertz: No sir, I’ll try to send a cab from our garage in place A (I forgot the name), if not possible I’ll have to send one from Place B sir.
Me: Enough. I’ll call you back. Thanks.
Hertz was rated best car rental company recently (by whom? I forgot :(-just remember reading somewhere). Wondering why they are so insensitive to customer needs, despite being so expensive. I’ve told them the pickup point and destination. I understand there’ll be some dry kms (where cab has to travel empty before picking me and after dropping me), but as a customer I have no idea where their garage is located and where the driver will go after dropping me. if they have a garage some 100 kms away, certainly I’m not going to pay for their garage to garage travel. Most of the call taxis and meter taxis start the meters after we board the vehicle, prepaid taxis ask for a fixed amount based on the destination, but traditional full service car rental agencies still insist on garage to garage charges, which might work well with corporates they deal with, but an individual may not always be comfortable with this scheme, mainly when they can't even give an estimate and expect me to blindly agree to whatever garage to garage time/km they claim. Why don’t they give a fixed quote keeping some provision for these dry kms?
Anyway, I pursued my journey in a cab arranged by hotel for Rs 350. Hertz would have charged atleast twice for the same service, under their garage to garage policy.
Example 2: HSBC Bank
HSBC direct selling agents had setup a tent in front of my place of work. I approached them, asking if I can open a savings bank account with them. The person went on explaining something like this: “Take this account sir, it’s very useful-you’ll get overdrafts which you can use for various things-interest is very low sir, just 1% per day”
Me: I don’t want to pay interest and not interested in overdrafts. Do you have a basic savings bank account where I can keep money and collect interest?
HSBC person: “Why sir, overdrafts are very useful no sir? Apply sir…”
Me: bye bye.
I’m sure SB account was part of powerVantage account and using overdraft facility is not mandatory. But this rep was not able to explain other advantages and was doing blah blah regarding overdrafts, turning a prospect off.
Similar: Me & SBI * Early investment experiences
Agree with u that not training the salesforce leads to loss of customers. But most of the guys trying to sell a credit card or bank product behave like parrots and keep on repeating what they have to say. I find it bad to shoo them away when they continue to follow us with their bank rhymes.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is of value translation. Many times they (like HSBC one you mentioned) come in with a narrow sales mission ( OD enabled accounts) and the promoters are often hired from some third party agencies on per day per person basis. Unless the promotions team is quite motivated and well trained, prospect contacts result in loss of business, which somehow never gets measured and known, unless the prospect is a blogger :)
ReplyDeleteInteresting post srinidhi....
ReplyDeleteCompanies need to realize that when they have Cust relation exec, these execs are the face of the company and the brand...its really imp for the co the focus on these services as much as advt to ensure that the brand experience is mantained.....
@ Laddoo,
ReplyDeleteYes, the Direct selling agents are pathetically trained. They are trained mainly to make all kinds of promises and close the deal...
@ Rajesh:
Congrats on being featured in Amit's India blogger directory.
Agree with your observations
@Purvi,
Exactly... Forget acquiring customers, they turn away those who are willing to do business with them, due to their sheer ignorance...
It is like selling car cover at the car show room, and you are asking "can I buy a car?"
ReplyDeleteAnd the sales man says "why dont you buy this cover, its very useful, it protects your car from dust and rain..."
They donot know what is an accessory and base product.
In your case, the sales person(which is normally an agency for HSBC) donot even know that power vantage(or any other branded premier account) is first a bank account and on top of it it gives some features.
That is one of the disadvantages of having contractors do your job, because they donot understand your product, and not necessarily feel attached with the product as an employee.
Hi Sri, your link is updated at my blog.
ReplyDeleteSrikanth,
ReplyDeleteWell sumarized. Thanks
@ Arun,
Thanks
Most of the sales agents are ill-trained or wrongly trained or just not motivated enough.
ReplyDelete@ Hari
ReplyDeleteYes. Thanks.