What’s this? I have free chocolates with my stationary order! Nice time for a blog post and a coffee.
I now have a pretty high opinion of my supplier. The reason they sent me truffles is that my order was messed up. We all know these things happen. We also know, it’s how they’re handled that makes the difference.
See, I ordered some boxes for archiving which frankly, I would happily put off. When they didn’t arrive I called to check there was no problem with the order. There was, I get a gift…plus two days doing more interesting things than carting paper around! So far as I can see this is a win-win situation. My stationary supplier has a big gold star and I will probably stick with them in the future…despite the minor delay. Customer Service = Achieved.
We don’t have complimentary apology gifts for our clients. If my clients’ delivery didn’t happen on time, I doubt very much that a box of chocolates would help the situation (excepting the possibility of it being used as a projectile, directly at my head). Getting it wrong should not be in the vocabulary of any self-respecting, real Designated Courier.
In many ways the experience is the same. Two different, pleasant and reliable sorts walk in, smile, and collect. At the destination these two pleasant and reliable sorts walk in, smile, and deliver. One is delivering a box of boxes, two days late with a complimentary apology gift to someone who is perfectly happy about it. The other has your tender for work in their hand, which was finished an hour ago and the deadline is in ten minutes, (they also know not to blurt your company name out and to ring you personally as soon as they’ve delivered).
Same or similar experience. Completely different job.
This is what I love about what we do. I love that there are thousands of people in this industry with an amazing, can do attitude.