Review - Insight

Just gloss won't do for quantum leap in service

Warren Fernandez
1,144 words
3 September 2005
Straits Times
English
(c) 2005 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

YOU'VE seen the advertisement. A Singaporean tourist, with family in tow, is surveying the Spanish Steps in Rome, jostling with a crowd of other travellers.

Somehow, by accident or neglect, he loses his bag - credit cards, passports, money, everything.

Frantic, he remembers a hotline number for his credit card company.

'Help, tolong, jiu ming,' he cries, pleading for assistance in every language he can muster.

'Not to worry, Mr Tan,' says the smiling, soothing service staff at the other end of the line. 'A new card will be delivered to you in the morning.'

Cue sunshine, stirring Italian arias and scenes of a happy Singaporean family feasting on their favourite Chinese cuisine in the middle of Rome.

Ah, the joys of membership of a privileged credit-card club, promising round-the-clock, round-the-world service.

Now, not having lost a credit card, I have never been able to check if these companies lived up to the hype, and delivered on their promises.

But it did set me thinking about the logistical back-up, cost and commitment it must take for leading companies to pledge such levels of service, putting their reputations on the line if they failed to match up to them.

Similarly, consider the ubiquitous no-questions-asked, return-anytime policy of American retailers. Every Singaporean who has shopped abroad has marvelled at this, and wondered why it could not be so here.

Of course, such a practice does not come free. It adds to business costs. But intense competition also constrains just how much of this can be passed on to consumers, who can always walk, wallet in hand, down the street, or click to the next Internet shopping site.

Another example: At my favourite bookstore in the world - Blackwells in Oxford - I used to marvel at the counter staff in the music section, who were knowledgeable enough to recommend CDs as if they had listened to the recordings themselves.

They had.

One staff member revealed to me that part of his job entailed listening to CDs during quiet periods in the store, so that staff could speak authoritatively, and passionately, on the subject.

In each of these cases, service is not just about counter staff smiling and scrapping, minding their Ps and Qs, to please customers.

It goes much deeper.

It calls for managements which value service to customers enough to be prepared to put in place systems that enable their staff to deliver first-rate service.

No amount of polite talk and commiseration would assure the hapless Mr Tan above if the credit-card company did not have a system in place to replace his card promptly.

And store hands in the United States could take returns readily only because managements empowered them to do so, figuring it was worth the cost.

Similarly, sales staff would never know enough about their products if managements under-staffed departments so that there was never enough time to learn about what they are selling.

Of course, none of this should be used as excuses for service staff not playing their part. Their attitudes to their jobs remain critical.

But, the current debate on how to boost service standards appears to me to be too narrowly focused on service staff. The onus seems to be mostly on exhorting them to do better, do more, in less time, and don't forget to smile while you're at it.

Customers, meanwhile, should appreciate these efforts more and pay for it.

If only it were so simple.

If Singapore is to make the quantum leap in raising service standards that it needs to match its competitors, companies and managements here are going to have to do more too. Too many, I fear, see service as a costly add-on, nice to have, but not really necessary to boost the bottom line.

Much more thought is going to be needed on improving the 3Ss of service: systems to deliver good service, staffing levels to make it possible and schemes to incentivise staff to do so.

Businesses will have to get each of these factors right to ensure that higher standards can be set and delivered, consistently and realistically.

For example, if a business sets up a supposed 'customer care' hotline, it should ensure that it is properly manned with people who can deliver help when needed. Simply having a cheery recorded voice to say, 'Your call is important to us. Sorry, we are unable to assist you at this time, please call again', will not do.

Or another example, bank tellers or service counter staff can be polite and attentive only if they are not overworked, and struggling to meet unrealistic quotas on the number of customers they must attend to in a given period.

Of course, putting in place and delivering such service standards will cost. But such spending is likely to pay dividends in building customer loyalty, and boosting business reputations, as study after study has shown.

Businesses, like it or not, will have to find ways to contain costs elsewhere to remain viable.

Besides, as a national-level spin-off, this additional spending is likely to create jobs downstream, in terms of training, new systems acquired and even higher manning levels required.

For customers, it will mean going beyond venting their unhappiness at service workers when they find standards not up to their expectations.

They should do better than that - take it up with a manager or the management - and hit where it most hurts, namely the bottom line, by making plain that poor service will result in loss of business and custom. That usually helps focus management minds.

And, on the flip side, customers should be prepared to pay and reward staff and companies that show they have thought through how to deliver good service.

So, what do you want?

Most people, I suspect, would say cheap and good service.

But a 'can't pay, won't pay, give good service but don't charge for it' approach to improving service standards won't get Singapore very far.

Unless service staff, customers and managements realise that good service is also about adding value, not just a superficial gloss, and are willing to go the extra mile to do so, Singapore will not see the jump in service quality it needs to make the leap into the world-class league.

This reality check will not come as pleasant reading for some, especially business operators in the service industry.

But, then again, as a columnist, my service is to tell it as I see it, and hopefully add value to the debate - not just to say, thank you for reading, and have a nice day.

warren@sph.com.sg

The writer is Foreign Editor of The Straits Times.

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Saturday Special Report

Smiling is not good enough

Leslie Lau , Malaysia Correspondent
597 words
3 September 2005
Straits Times
English
(c) 2005 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

Laid-back 'kampung-style' service and poor English result in customers getting ignored

KUALA LUMPUR - ENGINEER Ahmad Rashid, who lives in Kuala Lumpur, drove to a Penang beach resort while on holiday last year.

After alighting from his car, he looked around for help in unloading his luggage. But the bell-boys just brushed past him.

'They headed straight for a group of foreign tourists. There were no smiles or offers of help for me. Maybe it's because we Malaysians are poor tippers,' he told The Straits Times.

Welcome to the land of laid-back 'kampung-style' service.

In horror stories that abound, customer requests are usually ignored due to a poor command of English and a lack of training.

A hotel manager of a three-star hotel on the east coast, who declined to be named, said: 'There is a grave shortage of workers. Those who are good either get promoted or are poached by other companies.'

A number of his 200 hotel employees are Malays literally recruited 'straight from the kampung'. They speak very little English.

'When customers and guests ask them anything in English, they freeze. And many are too shy to get help from someone else. So the guests get ignored,' he lamented.

Throughout the service sector, more businesses are resorting to hiring foreigners from Myanmar, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines who are willing to work harder for less.

Chinese restaurant owner Jack Chan started hiring waiters from Myanmar and waitresses from the Philippines last year, mainly because getting competent local staff was near impossible.

'Foreigners are hardworking, learn fast and are friendly to my customers. We cannot afford to pay enough for good local staff to work for us. Malaysians just want to be managers, not waiters,' he groused.

Foreign waiters are typically paid about RM1,000 (S$450) a month. Malaysians expect double that salary as well as swift promotions, said Mr Chan.

Since he became Prime Minister two years ago, Datuk Seri Abdullah Badawi has often bemoaned the poor service standards in Malaysia.

He has frequently spoken of the country having first-class infrastructure but a third-class service mentality.

The government has spent hundreds of millions of ringgit to promote Malaysia as a major tourism destination in Asia.

Tourism, which rang in receipts of just under RM30 billion last year, is now Malaysia's second-largest foreign exchange earner after its manufacturing sector.

Yet, the draw for most of the 15.7 million tourists who visited Malaysia last year was the beaches, mountains and other natural attractions - not the service or the shopping.

The trouble, said Mr Ngiam Foon, president of the Malaysian Association of Tour and Travel Agents, is that Malaysia's service industry, from taxi-drivers to store assistants, has not been imbued with a 'tourism culture'.

He pointed out that there are already some things going for the unassuming and earnest Malaysian brand of hospitality.

Walk into any shop, restaurant or hotel in Malaysia, and one is likely to be greeted by relaxed smiles and a genuine, unspoilt friendliness. Over the past 10 years, as tourism became a money-spinner, the smiles widened further.

'But smiling is not good enough,' he told The Straits Times. Instead, Malaysia's service industry should aspire towards the friendly 'How are you doing?' charm of America, where staff go the extra mile to please customers.

'Some people say Americans are fake - but they deliver the goods and they meet expectations,' he said.

leslie.lau@excite.com

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