Dear LPG, 

I recently read an LPG post which dealt with the subject of customer satisfaction  (►►►).  So many of us have good cause to complain about the service that we get when we go shopping for anything these days, and I have to agree with DS’s comment that most pensioners of today will have memories of the days when the average shopper could expect so much more from their shopping experience, regardless of what they had planned to buy.  

I recently went into one of the few shops left in Lewisham Borough that sells electrical goods to get some rechargeable batteries for my landline phone.  I have to admit to knowing nothing about the ones I actually needed and went to the specialists to be sure of getting the right sort.  

The shop I chose was vast and full of potential customers, but luckily both the pay point and customer service desks are near to the entrance, so I queued up at the customer service desk to ask where the batteries were kept.  I am English so I know all about the art of queueing and when I finally got to the front of the queue and asked my questions I was directed to the pay desk where there was another substantial queue.  As I said, I know all about the art of queueing and finally got to the front of the customer service queue to be told that I needed to go to somewhere in the middle of the shop which was pointed at.

As you make the trek to any part of the shop, you cannot help but see all the other things on sale and I suppose that their plan is to force you past something else that will draw your attention, but I was missing the batteries.  More fruitless searching followed, and I did come across a shop assistant who was busy with another customer, but when you spot a bit of human gold dust you learn to follow it around in a sort of lineless queue in the hope of getting some service and my patience finally paid off.  

Some fifteen minutes after I first entered the shop I had found someone who would be able to take me to the product I wanted, but he had to leave me for another couple of minutes before coming back and pointing out the batteries I actually needed.   I had now been in the shop for about 25 minutes and the one thing that I noticed was that none of the shop assistants I had spoken to offered me the one basic customer-service essential of retail back in my day.   I am talking about service with a smile.  

I must say that I don’t think being approached by a member of staff with a positive air about them is vital to making a sale these days but, while I was only in the shop for about 35 minutes in all it occurred to me that they were there all day and being happy in any work you do has to reflect in your demeanour.  I must emphasise that none of them were rude to me but there was something really negative about the whole shopping experience.  

I could not help but ask to speak to the manager, and when he finally materialised he was no happier.  I made a point of starting my conversation with him by telling him that I was not having a go at him personally, but I had to ask the six-million-dollar question of the moment, ‘How many members of staff are available to help the customers?’  His answer was three, after which he went on to say that the budget that his management gave him would not allow for more.  I went on to mention that it was mid-December and there was a serious absence of any pre-Christmas cheer shown by the shop staff. To which he stated that he was doing his best.

He told me that he is used to being summonsed to answer the same question at half-hour intervals on every working day, unless one of his staff answered for him.  The question is often asked with an air of complaint resulting in all the staff feeling pretty demoralised most of the time because there just are not enough of them to go round.

I left the shop thinking that when I worked in a shop years earlier, the wages were not great, but customer care meant something very different.  There was something very special about approaching your client with an upbeat, interested attitude before having the time to offer that phrase, ‘Can I help you?’  to which many shoppers often answered ‘No, not at the moment, we’re just looking’, and it was your job to help them change their minds.  Back in the late 20th century, buying something electrical may well have taken just as long but the experience would have been much better.

The staff I saw in that shop that day had to be showing a reflection of the way that so many customers approach them when it comes to so many types of work where the top management now leave the staff that face the public to explain their budget cutting decisions.  

So, I know it means writing letters and making telephone calls to management offices but, while we are waiting in the queues, and on the phones, I ask that customers have a go at the administrative managers and are kinder to the workers that have to face the public…

FB, Lewisham