To think that customer service in a lot places has really gone downhill?

[thingscouldbemarvellous]

Seem to have experienced quite a few examples of really poor customer service recently. Aibu to think that customer service has gotten really poor in some sectors? No one seems to want to help anymore!!

I think companies feel they can get away with stuff, because of COVID. There’s less staff available. People are a bit desperate to get out and about so will put up with more.

I think customers have gone downhill.

So entitled, demanding & rude. People have go so much worse since covid. Try to deal with that with staff shortages as well as what people have going on in their Personsl lives

it depends what you mean.
lots of places are struggling to get staff and having to train staff at times when they would prefer to give them more time.
lots of businesses have lost all or most of their experienced staff and thats always going to impact service levels.
its the effects of brexit and covid. its a nightmare - especially in hospitality

I think a lot of places are short-staffed just now, and if you’re anywhere vaguely touristy also inundated with custom. It’s not a combination that makes for great service.

I agree. Companies like John Lewis, British Airways etc used to pride themselves on their amazing customer service but now it sometimes feels like a competition to get away with the absolute minimum. The result of years upon years of cost-saving measures to increase shareholder return and I think part of a wider trend to make the most money with the minimum amount of corporate social responsibility and accountability. But then maybe I'm just a cynic...

We’ve had really poor and slow service in a few restaurants recently. I think they’re still struggling for staff.

Customers have got more demanding and twattish. I work for a small company lucky enough to have retained most of our fully trained staff. Our customer service is immaculate, better now we have a new department dedicated to it. The amount of people who want something for nothing and they expect it yesterday has definately increased.

I thank my lucky stars I no longer work in hospitality. Is there any wonder they are short staffed with the appalling contracts, lack of training (because there is no time to train them) and more entitled customers?

I don't agree with the OP that no-one wants to help any more, just that the pandemic has seen some companies make an effort, and others use it as an excuse to make what was probably poor service to begin with even worse.

As for unpleasant and entitled customers, I think that has been a trend over many years.

So many places are short staffed, the staff not sick or isolating or on leave are often burnt out.

Considering we’ve been through a global pandemic (and not out of the woods yet) I think customer-facing roles are increasingly hard to fill and hard to retain staff. People are seeking wfh jobs or hybrid working. Especially parents who may have to cope with sudden school closures again.

My experience has been that a lot of companies have seen Covid as an excuse to lay off staff and expect the remaining ones to cope while blaming Covid/Brexit/whatever for poor customer service. I don't think this necessarily extends to hospitality where the links between Brexit and lack of staff are well known, I'm thinking more like shops or call centres. I do know of some places that used Covid to make staff redundant when the work was still there, I was one such person and I know of others who worked for different employers.

examples of this op???

It’s a by-product of people demanding cheaper and cheaper goods and services. Someone mentioned BA and how they used to pride themselves on customer service but now seem to be on a mission to only do the legal minimum. That’s because customers are demanding the minimum when it comes to price. Something has to give.

I emailed five local companies to ask for a call back / quote for a job at my home....not one got back to me !?!?

Yesterday I was quite surprised to see an assistant by a beauty stand in Boots scrolling on her mobile phone. I then saw another assistant doing this while manning the women's changing room in John Lewis. I'd never seen this before then saw two in one afternoon!

In lreland people who got a government payment while furlonged have chosen not to go back to work yet. Others have returned to their home country. So restaurants and hotels are struggling to operate with an inexperienced staff who sometimes have no idea what's happening. A lot of the staff are young and frankly couldn't give a dam! I have experienced this a lot this summer but accepted it as a temporary fall out from Covid. I have been in restaurants that resembled Faulty Towers at times.

@GinJeanie

Yesterday I was quite surprised to see an assistant by a beauty stand in Boots scrolling on her mobile phone. I then saw another assistant doing this while manning the women's changing room in John Lewis. I'd never seen this before then saw two in one afternoon!

To be fair, manning fitting rooms is soul-crushingly boring I hated it when I worked retail!

@ny20005

I think customers have gone downhill.

So entitled, demanding & rude. People have go so much worse since covid. Try to deal with that with staff shortages as well as what people have going on in their Personsl lives

That ^^ I cried before 9am the other day because of customers, it has never ever been this bad Our service is the same as it's always been but people are a lot more demanding Someone told me "I have to listen to people rant at me at work so now I'm going to rant at you" I mean WTF

When I worked in retail, a mobile phone on the shop,floor was an absolute NO NO.

I emailed five local companies to ask for a call back / quote for a job at my home....not one got back to me

Back-logs from the lockdowns and shortage of materials plus staffing issues have resulted in a lot of builders, plumbers etc having massive waiting lists.

Traders aren’t competing for our patronage right now - we’re competing for their attention. You’ll have to work harder than an email!

I moved out of retail during the pandemic. We always had our phones on the shop floor. It is how the rest of the team communicates with us and how we look things up for customers.

@ny20005

I think customers have gone downhill.

So entitled, demanding & rude. People have go so much worse since covid. Try to deal with that with staff shortages as well as what people have going on in their Personsl lives

This. Customers are fucking horrible this year, and staff are jaded by it

I'm a retail manager.... our stores app is in our phones

Whereas the stores handsets are glitchy we can look things up easily on our phone

We are all in teams groups for urgent info. Like today, when we had thieves in targeting a specific area

We can use our own phones to price check as well. It's fine

Also people totally took the piss out of customer is always right policies; which pretty quickly put an end to them in many places

Customer is rarely right. And the older I've got the less tolerant I've become.

I have found the opposite.

The places that have survived the pandemic have done so by showing outstanding customer service and have built a community with their customers.

Those with crap service are now closed.