"Customers are not always right but they have all the right"

We are all in the field of customer service and as a professional, most of the things that we do, are for the sake of our customers. This may be the reason why a popular reminder for employees is the quote “Customers are always right!!”.

We always encounter this quote of valuing customers by reminding our employees, that we should always treat our customers as if they are always right. This gives employees the paradigm that when we have customers at work, or in our business, we should keep in mind that they are always right, even though, they are not right all the time.

I remember during my college years I had a professor that I admired and who inspired me to study very well in his management subject. He gave this motivational tip in handling customers that up until now, as a professional I still get to practice and apply while at work.

During one of his class he said to us that “Customers are always right” and that’s a good point of view, however, here is a much better point: “Customers are not always right, but they have all the right”. When I entered the professional world, this quote from my professor, Mr. Corpin really made a great impact and I applied it when I started handling customers of all sorts in different jobs that I have had as a professional.

During college I was a part time waiter, I used this frame of mind during an instance when a customer in the restaurant, from where I worked really embarrassed me because of an incident when I was cleaning their table, I almost dropped some of the contents of a tray to his fellow guess, luckily, I caught it (I made use of my great spidey reflexes). Nobody got wet nor got hurt, and no harm was done during that moment, but there was this customer who really made it look like that I intentionally wanted to drop the tray, he made sarcastic comment in such a way that he spoke loudly as he told me while in front of the other guess in the room, that I should go and repeat what I just did, while trying to emphasize my clumsiness, although it was just a near miss incident.

It was a truly an embarrassing and a traumatic experience for a newly hired guy on the job, everybody was looking, and all eyes was on me. Some of them were even smirking while that customer was uttering those words. Thanks to the advice of my professor, I just apologized and tried my best to understand that there will be customers like that, and after all I almost did drop the tray, even though I was able to catch it. I believe the customer was not right to treat me the way he did, and even try to escalate the situation by raising his voice and with the intention to embarrass me in front of the other guess, because after all no drinks got spilled on them, however, they do have the right to express their emotion of dissatisfaction of me nearly dropping one of the drinks to one of their colleagues, so I just took the treatment in a positive way and apologize for what happened.

I was also able to use this mindset during my job as a customer service representative for a telecommunication company in the U.S. I worked as a warranty CSR, in that job we normally expect that once a customer will be on the line, there is a big possibility that they have a complaint about their unit.

In our office from where we sit beside with other agents, I would hear some of my team mates venting out their stress from obstinate and impolite customers by muting their phone unit, then bursting out loud their feelings with use of profane words, and you would even think that the person beside you is in a fight. I really don’t blame them, because there really are some customers that are just so unreasonable. On the other hand, thanks to this mindset of my professor, I am proud to say that never did once I muted my phone to speak of profane words, just because the customer was already rude, irritating, and being unreasonable, while throwing disrespectful words at me.

I inculcated in my heart and mind, that they have the right to express their feeling even though it’s not right to speak to a person in front of you, or even behind a phone in such a disrespectful manner. I look at it in a perspective that I want to help them resolve their problems. It’s my job to give satisfactory service to my customer’s needs, and I enjoy providing solutions than getting engulf in the problem. This mindset helped me to be more open-minded, and look at the problem as a challenge to be solved, without me treating the situation too personally up to a point that I’ll be stooping down to the level of a customer through picking up the trash that they were throwing at me.

Some other instance that I that I used this mindset was when I tried to call back a customer, because the line got cut off. When he answered back during my introduction spill, he was irate, since during that time, he was having an argument with his wife. He vented out his emotions in me through shouting. And again, as politely and in a calm manner, I explained that I wanted to extend my assistance to his concern when he called, and that I apologize due to me calling back at an in-appropriate time. I would say that it was an effective approach because through it, the anger of the customer slowly subsided, the customer apologized and said that he was just really irritated due to the argument that he had with his wife. He even thanked me for understanding his situation. It really felt good, it was my last call for the day, and it made me felt really satisfied with how I handled that situation, so I went home feeling proud to have resolved that issue.

I always try to put myself in the shoes of these customers, that they are just like us, who just wants to be given back our proper remuneration for our time and money’s worth. This mindset helped me become more empathetic and less affected with difficult to handle customers. I’m sure you will be at some point when you are in the customer service field of work, this mindset can greatly help you really relieve stress by not taking it too personal when a customer is insisting himself/herself, just remember the famous quote of Captain Jack Sparrow “The problem is not the problem, it’s our attitude towards the problem”.

The mindset of “CUSTOMERS ARE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT, BUT THEY HAVE ALL THE RIGHT”, can help make you become better service providers as employees/business owners, and problem solvers, being able to focus your attention on finding resolution to a problem and not focusing on the trash being thrown at you, instead looking at maintaining your composure while dealing with issues and problems of different types of customers.