Our Goal is excellent customer service, continuos improvement and we strive for perfection!

Our Goal is excellent customer service, continuos improvement and we strive for perfection!

Whenever I hear people or companies' goals for excellent customer service or striving for perfection, I can't help but feel how those statements are lip service that let people off the hook.

Someone can offer terrible service while striving for perfection. Companies can stink but as long as they stink a little less than they stunk yesterday, they are true to their continuos improvement mission.

Getting a knife stuck into me and then having it pulled out halfway probably isn't going to make me very grateful. How many times do we feel that way in our everyday life while surrounded by 'striving' to be the best euphemisms?

Our typical semi-annual foray into Nordstroms coincides with their two sales. On a recent visit, a salesmen showed us a pair of slacks, which were similar to the kind we'd already bought and thought didn't wear very well. The salesman chided us for not having brought the slacks back. We smiled and said we had bought them years ago. No matter, he said. Bring 'em back. We exchanged them a few weeks later (feeling a bit silly). This is not a commercial for that one retailer, but it is noteworthy because:

1. We've been trained to accept that if something is just OK, it's good enough.
2. We felt silly for somehow expecting that they would take them back years later even after being told to bring them back.
3. We only shop when there are sales, so it's not any costlier than other retailers who would simply shrug their shoulders.
4. we got a new pair of pants for free.

Would I pay a little more for that? Hmm….Would I write about it? Hmm...

This is the difference between a guarantee (remember those?) and a warranty. We've conceded guaranteed satisfaction with accepting a warranty against manufacturing defects. I know as well as anyone that paying a premium for great customer service upfront is hard to justify sometimes. it's not all that hard to justify after the fact when the proverbial fan splats, or even when there are minor issues like this one.

What is our ultimate responsibility to great customer service? Is it a strive, or is it a do?