How do you handle complaints from customers for work that your employees did? Do you have a company policy to cover this type of situation? I was thinking that I should require my employees to go fix the work on their own time, but I know from experience that customer complaints are often unjustified (once i had a customer complain about terrible streaks; when I went to look at the store, it was obvious that one of the store employees had taken Windex and a rag to the window! It looked horrible and was NOT the work of my guy).
The customers perception becomes their reality . Based on that the best thing to do is just say “my company will take care of that problem .” No need to debate with the customer who’s fault it was unless we think it’s going to be a recurring issue .
Unless an employee was grossly negligent no need to think they’re going to work for free . that’s just not going to happen.
Quality control, on site supervision and managing expectations of customers are all the hard challenges of running a business .
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It’s not legal to require a hourly employee to go back for free. Besides, you would probably lose employees quick trying to pull something underhanded.
It’s probably a good idea to send a different employee back too.
If the complaints are unjustified, you might want to think about replacing that client if it’s becoming a hassle.
I know call backs are a pain, but it’s just part of business. You should expect some of that. If you are getting a lot of that, you may be selling to the wrong type of client, or you might need a new employee.
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Can you tag a touch up at the end of the day after other scheduled jobs are done? Or at a convenient time to send someone to take care of it? Things happen, take care of it, discover what happened and fix if you can and move on. If it is a bad customer - well, there are more out there. If it is a one off on an employee - not a big deal. If it is often of an employee - well, you know how to fix that.
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Complaints, damages, travel pay all are part of running many businesses.
I get trying to keep costs down but having employees has many responsibilities that are the companies obligation
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I would take a personal trip to the customer’s home and talk to them personally and rectify the issue. That would handle the customer service aspect and would provide them peace of mind. Depending on what happened, go from there. If it was your employee, then assure the customer that everything will be taken care of by your company. IMO
