What Australia Can Learn From The US On Customer Service

The nuances of making a customer happy

January 2018 I landed on the soil of the beautiful country of Australia in the city of Melbourne. Melbourne stole my heart right away. The by-lanes, the train and tram networks, cafes all over the place reminded me of a lot of cities such as Kolkata or San Francisco where one also finds such similarities. It had so much warmth (being summer pun intended) and I felt welcomed. We had just migrated from the US straight to Australia. The US was the home to my heart. Among the many new things we were adjusting to, one thing I deeply missed about the US was the amazing customer service that we kept getting through our stay there. In comparison, I found it quite hard to adjust here as we went to set up utilities, shop for home items, or even simply order something by post. Here are some of my stories in the three years of living here that made this particular difference stand out for me.

As a Bank customer

One of the first items on the list of setting up in a new place is a bank account. I went to one of the top four banks here and the process was fairly simple. A few days into this, one night as I was setting up international transfer over internet banking, I received a pop-up from the bank saying — “Your account is showing unusual activity. It’s being shut down”. This message is vague and it could have been as much from a hacker as a bank itself. I had just tried to transfer about 100$ as a test amount. After this pop-up, I could no longer log in to internet banking. This was at night 10 pm. I called customer service only to find out it had closed at 8 pm.

With much frustration, I entered the bank branch the next morning at 11 am. I sat with the counter person, for almost an hour to unlock my account. I asked her simple genuine questions — Why would there not be 24/7 customer service knowing anyone can transact late night? It’s 2018! If there is unusual activity, that particular transaction can be blocked, why did internet banking have to completely disabled? Even if such is the case, the customer should be able to unlock it themselves through some security questions. The pop-up message was not very clear, there was no customer service available and I had to walk into the branch to solve my own problems?

My US bank account had tight security but in favor of the customer. If any such activity was detected, I would receive a call from the bank asking if it was me who did that, if I needed any additional help or that I would receive a call later in the day to assist me with step by step to set up of international payments. This was the first time I felt the US has ruined me for life in such regards.

As an online shopping customer

The US is quite popular for online shopping with giants such as Amazon making consumerism a child’s play. I had the same expectation here somehow. I decided to buy some home decor items and books online. I was able to track the progress of the delivery as well. Over numerous occasions (I can count at least 5–6 of online orders) despite the tracking, I never received the package. I only found a note in my letterbox saying — “Sorry we missed you. This was the final attempt. Please collect your package from____”.

How could that be when I was never pro-actively informed about the package and the status online directly said Delivered? I went to the post office and raised concerns about this. Their notes said no one was home to receive it. To which I replied, I was home, nobody checked with me.

To solve this mystery, for my next package, I worked from home awaiting it. The delivery man buzzed my home and I opened the gates to the apartment building. I went to my front door on the 10th floor awaiting his arrival. 15 mins passed. I hurriedly went down to find a note in my letterbox that said “Sorry we missed you. This was the final attempt. Please collect your package from____” What the hell??!

As far as I knew, this was the first attempt. I immediately drove to the post office trying to calm myself down as much as I could. I heard the same words — “ The notes say no one was at home”. I almost thought I would scream when I said: “Did a ghost buzz the person into the building?” In contrast, still owning a US credit card, which I renewed while living in Melbourne, I got all pro-active emails about my package and when it would arrive especially this was an international courier. I was informed when to stay home since it was to be signed. I waited for them and they made sure it landed in my hands. The same US credit card which I had misplaced a few years back, was delivered to my doorstep in Dubai when I was vacationing. Worldwide service.

I am not asking for more intricate digital tracking or special calls. If someone let you in the building, isn’t it obvious someone is home? Wouldn’t a more appropriate message be “We waited for you by the letterbox and left” instead of “Sorry this was the third attempt”. How incongruous! I missed the genuine concern for my problems and proper notifications.

As a mobile service provider customer

My next story is how I got an 800$ bill from my telephone company which every month didn't exceed 80–100$. Upon calling them I learned that in the month of Sept 2019, whilst I was in India, international calling was not set up properly. My husband had chosen a 5$ additional plan that would give him at least 300 more mins than the regular plan. My husband over the chatbot asked the operator to apply this 5$ package thrice thereby giving him a total of 900 mins to talk to me internationally. Something went wrong in that process and instead of being charged $15, we were looking at $800.

The telephone company argued that I had made a mistake. Fortunately, they also said that they stored the chatbots files and would investigate. Whilst this was happening, my telephone bill was set on hold. However, I kept getting reminder messages from the recovery dept to pay the bill else my connection would be terminated. There wasn’t any coordination between the departments that my case was being investigated. In the 6 weeks that followed, I had to give them repeated calls asking for updates. Finally, when my patience was over, I threatened to move to another provider simply due to bad service. It didn’t seem to strike them how odd it is for a customer’s bill to jump so much, send messages to terminate their service, and also not call back? Through their chatbots, they realized it was their mistake and apologized.

Whatever mobile phone complaints that I had (almost rarely) were promptly solved in the US. They called me back, provided updates, and even offered compensation when I felt distressed. All I was looking for was some empathy for the problems which I somehow never got.

What’s the problem?

Just a little bit of pro-active courtesy can go a long way to retain customers. I have so many more stories with airlines, shopping malls, parking tickets, from among my stories which I don't wish to spam you with. The issue is not industry-specific. I thought maybe with time, I’ll find the secret to this problem. Nope. Just yesterday Aug 2020, the home delivery person dropped someone else’s food at my doorstep. I ran after him to return it, only to argue this wasn't the right address. Am I asking too much when some due diligence is needed?

What next?

Some of the world’s giants such as Facebook or Google are from the US. There is a lot that can be studied and adopted from the best practices, which will be quite useful and suitable for the changing scene in the Australian industries. With a rising startup culture in Australia, much can be learned in terms of customer engagement and satisfaction from the US which will go a long way in sustaining relationships.

In another conversation, I have made a reverse comparison — ’ What The US Can Learn From Australia About Community Living’ is the title of my article.