David Taylor, CEO of OnGuard, gives his opinion on complaints management.
"Everyone has heard stories of internet providers who have problems with providing access after you have moved house or telephone companies that continually fail to process your cancellation. It’s so frustrating. Often it’s just a simple act and an easy process but it can cause such a lot of frustration. How is it possible that so many companies still offer such low customer service even though so many investments in Customer Intimacy and Customer Satisfaction have been made? We can do better.
Our latest Credit Management Trendmeter report shows that 4.8% of sales are paid too late due to a dispute on the invoice. Although the majority of the invoice complaints are due to simple administrative errors, it takes, on average, 16.5 days to solve a complaint. In my opinion this is way too long. Just imagine that your company is 16.5 days without internet or telephone. That would be a disaster.
If credit managers were fully responsible for solving invoice disputes then the solution time would be significantly reduced and payments received earlier. But our research shows that only 2 out of 10 Credit Managers are responsible for solving invoice disputes. And that is just strange considering that the main objective of the credit manager is improving cash flow. If credit managers were given the responsibility for solving disputes, than sales would be paid much faster and customer satisfaction would be improved even more."
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