How to resolve a complaint from an online shopper

Although it’s never nice to receive a complaint from a customer, this person is actually probably doing you a favour: for every one person that complains, it is thought that there are 26 others who didn’t say anything, the majority of which will just quietly decide not to return.

This person may have alerted you to a wider problem, and handed you two opportunities:

First – to win back their trust, and their repeat business;

Second – to address an issue you may not have known about before.

You may need some time to look into the issue your customer has raised. In the meantime, let them know that you’ve heard/read their complaint and will be back in touch in a timely manner.

If the complaint is made publicly, whether on social media or in an online review:

• Don’t delete the complaint – this won’t go unnoticed, just lead to further backlash
• Ask the author to write to you privately – reply with a neutral acknowledgement, do not address the complaint in a public reply, or match their negative tone, as tempting as it might be sometimes! Prepare a standardised message you can use in this situation.

Make sure that you understand the complaint and the products and services that caused the problem or complaint to occur. Try to consider the complaint from the customer’s perspective, and how you would be feeling if you were in the customer’s situation?

Has the customer explained what they expect from you and how they feel you can put it right? If not, what do you think you need to do to put things back in the customer’s favour?

Establish whether it was a human error, a technical issue or a procedural fault. Where in the supply chain did the issue originate, and what needs to happen to reduce/eliminate the probability of it happening again?

Once the investigation has been completed explain to the customer why what happened to them happened and how this differed to the norm. People accept that mistakes happen and if this is the case, being honest about it often reassures the customer that you are a reputable company.

Confirm the steps you’ve introduced to stop it happening in the future. Although this will not affect their current experience, they at least are more likely to buy from you again with the reassurance that they will not have the same ordering experience.

Confirm how you have/will put it right. You don’t want to leave a customer thinking that they have been short changed, but give too much away and you risk being taken advantage of in the future. It is always better to err on the generous side, especially if you have made a mistake. At the very least a customer should be compensated for costs and inconvenience caused.

Obviously! You’ve investigated what led to your complaint, so make changes to your process where relevant and viable. Even if you suspect your customer might be wrong, maybe the wording on your website isn’t clear enough, or there’s room to make a good system better still.