Dear M and S

[halfwayupthehill]

You might like to consider the following:
calling the manager when asked by a customer
having managers who greet disgruntled customers, smile, ask what the problem is etc and empathise rather than looking put out and talking only to shop assistant
having managers who know the contact details for complaints
having a store manager on duty (do you care about your customers or business?)
I rarely shop there, every time I remember why!

What was the problem?

The actual problem wasn't an isssue...the way they handled it made it ten times worse...

Halfway

Years ago (i don't shop there much at all now) that was what M & S was good at. Really professional staff.

Depends really. Some customers can be just as difficult as poor customer assistants.

Freya

Yes of course. I have worked in a shop and as a hospital receptionist, so I know what gits the general public can be. But there is a minimum level of politeness and helpfulness that someone should expect to be greeted with

It really does depend on the customer and the issue.

I've worked in a shop before and some of the customers were incredible for all the wrong reasons.

Agree Tidy, have met some incredible people when working in a shop.

I feel your pain, its un be liveable how some stores and staff treat you these days when huge names are going under, its so arrogant.

I once had an amusing tete a tete with an m and s food hall manager about the level of service and how it was way below waitrose, and he said he begged to differ, the next day Rose their chairman or something said the same as me. in the media.

i am astonished by some of the service I get I have worked in all sorts of customer facing roles and had to deal with all sorts of mad, bad and horrid people, and always with a smile! I always put the customer first, it seems anyone can ge a job these days and manage to keep it inspite of zero customer serivce skills.

I used to work in M and S (20 years ago), also WHS, Macdonalds and a call centre.
I am just amazed at staff attitudes and sloppy managers who don't even know the address for head office. And not having a store manager on duty. Exactly the same situation a few months ago, so not a one off.
You can take a disguntled customer and take it as an opportunity to solve the issue or at least act like you care or you can not give a toss, lose repeat business and get bad publicity. I just don't get it.
John Lewis just screwed up my online order. They apologised, offered goodwill gesture and guess what..i am about to place another order with them.
Actually, just remembered m and s used to have a training video with staff joking that the job wd be so much easier without the customers..this was to show us the wrong way of doing it.
Leaving the store, i came across a broken lift and a wheelchair user having an argument with a security guard who had hiddenhis ID so she couldn't get his name. The argument had been going on some time and while we waited there clearly was a problem in getting a manager so loads of other customers were watching. Frankly a responsible store would have had a store manager there in minutes.

But you've emailed this to them right?

I mean rather than relying on them reading Mumsnet?

Worra.... You know as well as I do that big companies monitor social media far more assiduously than their 0845 customer service lines.. Had enough of dealing with M and S today, and have no faith that there IS anyone to complain to...why on earth do they not have store managers?

I don't know, why don't you email them and ask?

This is the point I'm trying to make

Even if by a really slim chance they do happen upon this thread, they're hardly likely to contact you about it.

You seem to have a fair enough complaint, so I'd get on and complain if I were you.

I complained to head office about the extremely poor customer service I received and got a £20 gift card sent to me. Not sure if that was to keep me sweet or if they contacted the staff involved and they admitted to it