ISO 9001:2015 – Newsletter – Issue 99

Issue 99 – Improve your process by thinking like a Customer!

ISO 9001:2015…

Improve your process by thinking like a Customer!

I appreciate receiving emails with questions and/or comments from readers of this Newsletter… please continue to do so since it provides me with ideas on what these publications should cover.  In my last Newsletter (ISO 9001:2015 Newsletter Issue 98) we discussed the topic of  “Why are you hanging on to that paper document?”, and now in this Newsletter we will discuss “Improve your process by thinking like a Customer!”.

The ISO 9001:2015 Element numbering…

Element 4 – Context of the organization
Element 5 – Leadership
Element 6 – Planning
Element 7 – Support
Element 8 – Operation
Element 9 – Performance evaluation
Element 10 – Improvement

Improve your process by thinking like a Customer!… If you’ve ever attended one of my ISO 9001 training events you would have heard me say that I see ISO 9001 as a Customer Satisfaction Standard… so if you want to consistently satisfy your Customers then this document contains all the ingredients to do so.  That’s why I believe that Clause 9.1.2 (Customer Satisfaction) is the most important Clause in the whole Standard.  If your Customers are not satisfied then there is something broken in your Quality Management System (QMS).  One more thing, when I conduct audits, I always try to wear the “hat” of the Customer… this helps me to focus on what questions to ask and where to direct my attention.  When you think like an actual Customer… it will be clear what the important processes are within your QMS.

Want an example?… A couple of months back I had the occasion of contacting the Customer Service Department of one my favorite, and often used, online retailer…. they are the biggest player in the world, and their name rhymes with the largest river in South America.  The issue I was contacting them about was as a result of a price drop (of over 30%) on a fairly expensive item that I had purchased a few weeks before (and which was still within the “return” period).  After chatting with a couple of Customer Service Reps who continuously repeated the fact that their “Policy” (read “Process”) doesn’t cover price matching… period…  I was eventually escalated up the chain of command to a Supervisor who after politely listening and exhibiting much compassion about my situation, repeated emphatically that they do not have a price matching policy (read “process or procedure”).  I then asked if they realized that I could simply solve this problem by buying this exact same item again at a lower price, and then returning the previously higher priced one.  I thought this was an obvious example of a process improvement for a company who made it to the big time with one of the best Return Polices out there.  Which is why their response astounded me… they enthusiastically encouraged me to do just that… even offering to initiate the “return process” right then and there.  I decided to outline all of the “steps” (read “COSTS”) that they would be duplicating… Order re-Handling, Warehouse re-Handling, Item re-Shipping… all at a reduced price for the item… so wouldn’t it be cheaper to just refund the price difference?  All of that “cost” information didn’t affect the Supervisor at all… he continued to say that it was their “Policy” not to price match, and that he was sorry for not being able to resolve the situation to my satisfaction.  I asked him to forward my complaint up the ladder, and I finished up by sending a detailed email to their Customer Help team.

The moral of this story?… Well, first of all, I’m very sure my complaint was buried among the rest and that they will not change their price matching policy on my account.  Likely they are hoping that most Customers in these situations won’t bother to go to all of the trouble of re-ordering and returning items that drop in price.  They will chalk it up as a small cost of doing business.  Yes, most Customers won’t bother checking prices on items they’ve already bought… however there are price change notification services that are becoming more and more popular, letting the Consumer know if they overpaid for an item, so they can seek recourse.  This by the way is another example of shifting the power from the Retailer/Manufacturer, into the hands of the Consumer.

There is also another watch-out for this online retailer… what they may be missing is that their competitors, especially one really BIG one… who is the largest bricks & mortar retailer in the world… is making moves to grab market share in the online retail business… they have also been known for years as the lowest priced player on the street, with the best return policy of any other company.  I think if they implemented a “price matching policy” for say the “duration of the return period”, that Customers might buy more items from their online website… this would mean that Customers now don’t have to worry about the price dropping a few days later.

I’ll finish up by saying this… if you THINK like your Customers… and if you REALLY LISTEN to your Customers… they will hand you all of the process improvements you will ever need… plus… they know exactly what your competitors are doing (or not doing)!