Investigation into customer service at Safeway Willerby Essay

On Monday the 17th of February my Business group went to the Safeway Superstore in Willerby to interview the customer services manager, Andy Bostock. This was good customer service for us as it is a busy store and he gave up time for us, and with also been customers it was good that he acknowledged us. While we was at the store we were going to carry out an overt and covert investigation (see appendix 1) which means that we was to ask Andy Bostock some questions and we where going to carry out several observations throughout the store. This is where Safeway, Willerby is located: The Safeway store tries to ensure that all customers wants and needs are catered for and they have such things as: * Toilets * Florists * Photo processing * Cafe * Home entertainment department- which sells such things as CDs and TVs * Kosher food * In store banking * Bakery * Meat * Fish * Fruit and Veg * The deli * Chilled * Italian * Beers, wine and spirits * Frozen Food * Health and beauty * Lottery * Organic food * Passport photos booth The importance of customer service to Safeway is that with the store dealing with 20-23 thousand people on a weekly basis it is important that they deal with each customers needs and expectations. If this does not happen it will mean that customers may go else where to a rival store. When new recruits start at Safeway they are given and induction talk which covers every aspects of the job description. They are given work books to fill in and the management will check them to make sure that they understand everything what is asked from them. They do not have off the job training as everything they need to know is within the store so there is no need for them to go anywhere else. The only off the job training is for managers and they may need training in a new aspect of customer service or need re-training for example. They do not re-train their staff which means that they may not gain as much knowledge as they may need. This could be that they do not want to spend any money on retrain ing them, which in the long run is bad because it will mean that employees will not know what they are doing and when customers have a problem may find it difficult to deal with them on the spot. Their training is from 12-16 weeks and they cover every aspect on what department that are going to work on. They only let their employees work on one department because it means that they know the department really well and can deal with every problem, which comes up. This is a good point because all of their staff will know everything about the department and will work hard on it and make sure that all the work is done correctly. The bad point of doing this is that if a customer comes up to a member of staff who does not know anything about the department which the customer wants information on it may annoy the customer cost they will want the problem dealt with quickly. Read more:  Customer Service Investigation Safeway deal with any problems quickly as the always make sure that their is a spare employee to deal with the problem. Also if a customers comes up and asks them where something is within the store, they are trained to ask the customer whether they want them to take them or tell them. This is because the customer may want to make some other purchases before they go to the item what they are looking for, and the thing what they are asking for may be at the other side of the store and it may annoy the customer if they are taken their before making other purchases because they will have to go back on them self’s. When customers pay for their goods they get a receipt and this has information which is relevant to their purchases, but on the Safeway receipt it has the following information: * The store opening times- this means that customer will be able to see the next time the store is open. * Who the customer services manager is- this means that if the customer has a problem they can contact Andy Bostock as quickly as possible. * Who the till operator is- if you have a problem with something then you can report to the customer services manager and they can then deal with the person or give them more training if needed. * Advertising the Safeway magazine- it is making customers aware of the magazine so that they can pick it up. It also has the date, time, address and telephone number at the bottom of the receipt. This is so customers know when they made the purchase and if their is a problem they can contact the store my mail or telephone. (See appendix 2). This related to customer service because if the service what they get is bad, the customer services manager will know who did this and if they have done this before they will be able to discipline them. The information what the customer gets on the receipt is important to only to them but to the customer service manager. If the machine breaks down it will mean that it will effect the customer-employee relations. The methods of payments what Safeway have are cash, card and cheque. So this means what ever the customer wishes to pay with Safeway can deal with it. So this is good because if they only expect cash for example it will mean that if Safeway are not catering for all customers they will start to go elsewhere. Safeway do not offer a home delivery whether it will be by people doing it through the phone or via the Internet. This is because Safeway have never been interested in it and would rather spend their money on investing in other things which will be more beneficial to the employees and customers. With other competing companies such as Sainsburys offering this service it may be wise if they did look into it and if they did not get many customers then stop doing it. It would make it easier for older people to order online or via the phone, this would also be beneficial for people that are in a wheelchair as it means that they do not have to leave their home. Safeway do not have any members of staff who are trained in dealing with foreign customers, as they do not usually get a lot of them. If Safeway did decide to train someone in this it will mean that it will give them a good reputation will foreign people for understanding their needs. When a disabled customer comes into the store, Safeway make sure that they have all the assistance they need. They ask them if they would like a member of staff to help them shop, which is like a personal shopper this is because for example if a wheelchair customer comes in and the can not reach the top shelf for an item the personal shopper will be along side them to get the item. The cater for disabled customers by offering: 1. 6 Disabled parking spaces at the front of the car park so it doesn’t mean that they have to travel far to get their. 2. Have wide isles so that it is comfortable for wheelchairs to get through. 3. They have special trolleys which are trolleys that can just fit into an electric wheelchair so it means that they can carry on shopping easily. They also offer smaller trolleys for their customer who have a disability. 4. They have a disabled toilet at the front of the store. Safeway have realized that a lot of disabled people do come into the store, so they have made it easier for them to shop by offering these types of services for the disabled customers to use. Safeway decided to no longer have the crà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½che and make way for the home entertainment department this is because the home entertainment department will effect everyone as the crà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½che will only effect people who are bringing in small children. The crà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½che also lost its popularity with customers and Safeway where losing money on it and it seemed the right place to put it because customers have to walk through the whole store to get to the department. At the tills at the front of the store each one has a change draw and this is easy for the staff to use as if they need change quickly they have access to it and it means that customers will not get distressed. Safeway make sure that they have adequate staffing levels at all times and they do this by knowing what they sold the same time last week and giving the employees the hours on the tills. For example on a Saturday morning they may take à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½10,000 so they will need more people on the tills to cater for all the customers, but on a Monday morning they may only take à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½1000 so they will not need to have all the tills on, they may only need about 4. When it was Christmas they gave their customers who where waiting in the cue free mince pies which meant that they where offering a good customer service to all of their customers. Every department in the store has its own employees so if they is a promotion on alcohol for example it will mean that they will need more staff to get all the alcohol out onto the shop floor. They also have a night shift who work 10-7 which means that they get all of the stock from the stock room out for the morning and to make room for the delivery the next morning. This is good for the customers as they are getting the freshest products at any given time because as soon as it arrives it will be put out. When we looked at the stock room it was untidy which meant that it might be difficult for everyone to know where everything goes. They did not have a stock room manager, which for a store of that size is a bad thing, as not every member of staff is doing their job correctly. If a stock room manager was introduced it will improve the amount of damaged goods as well as improving the quality of the stock room. With their being no stock room manager it will be made easier for the staff to steal products and whilst we was their he said that there were a lot of unsolved theft and that they lose a lot of money in the Willerby store, and this could be the reason for this. They have eight cameras in the store and one main one on the alcohol department this is because this is the most common theft. This means that it is giving the customers a lot of security and makes them feel more save when they are their and they also have a security guard who works six days a week. When they call code 50 over the tannoy all male members of staff go to the front of the store to stop the thief, this is because if their is more than one the security guard will not be able to deal with them. This is done to make the customers feel more safe when they are shopping at the store. Their health and safety procedures are gone through on the day they get their training. It is important that all staff know the health and safety procedure incase of an emergency such as a fire. When it was the firefighter strike they where given extra training which consisted of videos and leaflets what Safeway came up with to make sure that they where aware of everything what was going on. They also put posters up in the staff room and in the stock room to always keep them aware of the dangers. They made sure that everything was double-checked to cover their backs. This was excellent customer service as they knew that fire fighters may not be able to get to the store incase of a fire, so they make sure that everything is checked for the safety of the customers. When the fire alarm goes off they can detect where about it is in the store and they will then go and see if it was set of deliberately or it was just a prank, and if it was deliberately they will then evacuate the store. Safeway’s buildings are not insured so this means that with the money what they save they can invest into other things what will benefit the company. But if their is a fire within a store and it gets burnt down they will lose a lot of money and last year two stores went down with fire and it meant that they got no money. So they have to take money from elsewhere. They also have a hazard book which employees fill in if they think there is a problem and this is checked everyday. It means that if there is a problem the management can deal with them quickly to benefit the customers and keep them safe. They have 1st aiders in the store all the time which means that if a problem does arise with a customer been injured they can deal with it quickly and correctly. The 1st aid facilities what are in the store are mainly for the employees not the customers. Safeway communicate with their customers by having the following things: * Tannoys- if a child is lost for example they could tannoy the child’s parent or guardian to come and pick them up * Leaflets advertising their special offers- making the customers aware of what they have to offer. These usually come through the post box with the free supplement newspaper what residents get. (see appendix 3) * Walkie-talkies between employees- they can contact each other if a problem comes up and can be easily dealt with. * Notice board- this informs the customers of any events coming up and what they are for. The ways in which Safeway assess and monitor the quality of customer service are that they used to have an ABC card and this could recognize how much money a certain customer spends in Safeway over a period of time. It was a point scheme where if you spent over a amount of money you would get points which in the long run would mean that you will get offers and free things depending on how much money you have spent. They stopped doing this when a new board of director came in and said that it was a waste of money and that money could be spent elsewhere. When we asked Andy on what he thought of it he said the same, and the money what would be saved in producing the cards could be spent on more productive things, but why does store cards work for other supermarkets such as Sainsburys and Tesco? ABC Card: Safeway used to have mystery shoppers but then that stopped because a mystery shopper was not a true reflection on the store as they have two mystery shoppers a month and the Willerby store gets 20-23 thousand customers a week. So the stopped doing this because they started to realize that it was not working. Safeway carried out a survey to get some feed back on what the customers though on the store and what the good and bad points. (see appendix 4) They survey was done by 60 people on Friday 5th April to Sunday 7th April. The survey covers the following things: 1. Hygiene 2. Staff 3. Checkouts 4. Solutions to improving staff service 5. Best in fresh 6. Items which where of a poor quality 7. Product and price 8. Availability 9. Who the shoppers are 10. Where else they shop 11. Suggestions for improvement The survey is then analyzed by head office and the management team of the Willerby store and they will talk about the results and what they are going to do with them and how to make improvements. This is very good customer service because it is giving the customers a chance to express any opinions they may have of the store whether it is good or bad. Also if they do make a suggestion or say what they think and the next time they go in it is dealt with it will make the customers feel as if they have say on what goes on within the store. The customer services desk is at the front of the store as soon as you walk in, which means that it saves the customer walking through the store and hopefully the problem can be dealt with by the people at the customer services desk. Customer complaints are dealt with by either phone, letter of face to face. They do not offer an email service where they can directly email the store with any problems which may need looking at as email is one of the most common ways of communicating. If a customer does complain Any Bostock (customer services manager) will personally deal with the complaint this is because this time he will know that it is dealt with correctly and the other point is why has the customer complaint and what can be done for this customer complaint to come about again. If its a face to face problem he will go to the customer services desk and try and ask the customer what the situation is and come to some compromise. If its on the phone, the customer services desk will try and deal with it then but if its a major problem Andy will take the call and deal with it appropriately. Then finally he will reply to any letter, which is sent to him regarding a customer complaint. The most common complaint is that customers are cueing to long at the tills. They try and deal with this by having enough staff to cover if there is a rush on and this is worked out by using the week before figures. If all tills are on and customers are still complaining the only way you can deal with them is by apologizing to them because their is nothing more you can do at that moment in time. They also had a suggestion box where customers could put in any suggestions or how the felt it would work better, but they had to stop doing this because it turned into a customer complaint box and they did not want this. Safeway need to come up with a new suggestion scheme as it is important for Safeway to understand what the customer wants and the best way is through suggestion schemes because it is easy to do and cheap to operate. Whilst I was at the store I carried out my own observations and I came up with the following results. The car park was shared with Iceland, Focus, Poundstretcher, Jonathan James, Francios and wickes. This meant that by having the store on a retail park it meant that customers could do other types of shopping if they needed to. Safeway did have its owns trolley parks that where scattered around the car park, which meant that customers did not have to walk back with their trolley where ever they are parked because it if they are old, they will not want to be walking back to Safeway with their trolley if they are parked at the other side of the car park. Other benefits what the car park had where: * 16 Child and parent parking spaces- these where directly outside the store so it a parent comes with a small child, the child is not running around the car park, they can just go straight into the store * 6 disabled parking spaces- These where next to the child and parent parking which are directly outside the store. Disabled people may find it had to walk across a big car park but with these parking spaces been their it is making it easier for them to cope. I personally feel 6 spaces is not enough, this is because quite a lot of retired people may be classed as disabled and they have the most free time as they do not have to go to work, so with expanding the parking spaces for the disabled they may create a new customer segment. * 2 Zebra crossings- These where going towards the front of the store where the entrances where. This is good customer service because if their is a lot of traffic and you can not make it across the road with the zebra crossings been their, it will make it easier for the customer. Safeway provide a variety of different trolleys for every type of customer. This is because if they have different types of trolleys it means that if customers only want a small shop their is small trolleys. The advantage of Safeway trolleys are that you do not have to put a pound in, this is good because a customer may not have a pound coin in change and if they dint they would have to go and get it changed before they even started the shopping. With the trolleys not having a pound put in them it means that they could get stolen and this would mean a loss in profits for the company because each trolley costs about à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½50 to make. Also around the surrounding area there is always trolleys just dumped because they is no need to return them back to Safeway. All the trolleys are kept under a shelter which means if it does rain the trolleys are still dry so the customers do not have to dry them down. Types of trolleys: * Large trolleys * Medium trolleys * Small trolleys * One seat baby trolleys * Two seat baby trolleys * One seat child trolleys * Two seat child trolleys * Wheelchair trolleys * Baskets They also have a post box which is outside the store with a stamp machine inside the store (which was out of order), but the customer can also buy stamps from the confectionery desk which is next to the customer service desk. With Safeway selling stamps it means that if a customer wished to send somebody a birthday card they could get the stamp and post it all within the store. The post box is emptied several times a day to make sure that the post is delivered on time. Along with stamp machine they where a phone card machine and a savings stamp machine. The phone card machine only sold BT Cellnet cards which meant that if customers wanted to get a different one they would have to go to the confectionery desk because they do not sell the cards at each till. This is bad customer service because they may just want to do all their shopping at once and if they have to go somewhere else in the store it may distress them. With the savings stamps this is a booklet what customers can get and they can collect them over a period of time, usually up to Christmas so when it comes to do their Christmas shopping they will have an amount of money what they will spend. A savings booklet is a good idea because if a customer is buying a stamp a week, you know that they are going to come back at Christmas and spend it and hopefully more to do their Christmas shopping. The toilets what Safeway have are: 1. Ladies 2. Men’s 3. Disabled 4. Baby Change The toilets are at the front of the store which means that you can go to toilets before you start your shopping or after it, but if you go after shopping it will mean that you will have to leave you shopping unattended because their is no secure place where you can leave your shopping. When I went into the toilets I was not impressed with the standard of them, this is because as soon as I walked into them their was a smell which was very of putting and meant that I wanted to be as quick as possible. This is bad customer service because their was nothing done about it, if their was some sort of air conditioning in their it would make it easier. The floor was also very dirty and their was water all over the floor underneath the sink, which meant that the toilets are very rarely checked by the employees because in some toilets there is a sheet up to say when it was last checked and if there where any damages. If the toilets are not checked regularly it may stop customers from using them because of the standard of them. When I went into the toilets their where a lot of damages like holes in the wall and their where no bins so people where just dropping their rubbish on the floor. This gave the toilets and overall tacky feel to it and I personally would not use them again. If the toilets are not improved it may put customers of from using the store all together. The music of the store was aimed at the more older people, this is because this is their main target audience because you hardly get children or teenagers shopping in supermarkets. The music is controlled my head office which means that Safeway Willerby have no control which if the majority of customers are different from other stores they may wish to change the music slightly to make them come back. The music what they do play is very upbeat music, this is so that customers are feeling happy when they are shopping their. Whilst we where we was looking in the Entertainment department and we across and adult video which was on the second to bottom shelf which is easy for a small child to get hold of it. On the back of it had sexual images on it which meant that the child would be seeing them. This is very bad customer service because it is of adult content and its easy for the child to get hold of. On Safeway’s Website, the opening page is filled with information regarding a certain thing what is happening so for example the thing what is happening this month is Mothers day, so the opening is filled with information regarding Mothers day. (see appendix 5). They also have special offers what is making the customers aware of, so that they can purchase them. This can be food related or just other items such as dry cleaning and photo processing. They also have a recipe of the week, which is described in great detail as well as all their other recipes what you can look at online. Their Website is excellent customer because it is giving potential customers a chance to see what is happening within Safeway, and it is offering advice on the recipes that the customers may wish to make. Their Website also includes: * Store guide- this shows you where the nearest store is and how many miles away it is from your house. * Everything what is included in their stores from their specialized food to their service, which is not food related. * Company information- from the history of the company to the activities at the moment. * Drinks guide- this covers all the drinks from fizzy drinks to alcohol and expert advice is given. Overall Safeway’s Website is excellent because it covers all the information what you will need. Analysis of customer service: I am now going to analyze what the advantage and disadvantages are of Safeway Willerby in terms of customer service: Advantages Disadvantages With Safeway doing a survey it means that they are getting customer feedback which in the long run will benefit the company because with the results of the survey will they can improve the things what has gone wrong. There is no incentive of doing this and it is quite time consuming so the customers may rush it just to get through it, so if an incentive was launched they may be able to get more accurate results. The majority of their staff where of a mature age which meant that they had more experience with customers so they would know what they want. Also with employing older people it means that the management team will know that they are not coming into work with a hangover and they know that they are going to work well and not let them down, with the experience they have with customers. The toilets where a major disadvantage to Safeway Willerby this is because of the overall standard of them was poor. This gives the impression that Safeway Willerby are unhygienic and care very little about the standard of their customer service. If an employee checked the toilets every morning and afternoon, it could improve the standard a bit and it would reassure the customers that something is been done about them. With the security guard working 6 days a week, customers will start to pick up on when he is not their and they might try and get away with things such as theft. With him also working 6 days he will start to get tired and may not do his job properly. If another security guard was introduced it will mean that their is always a security guard in the store, this will assure the customers that they are safe with these security guards in operation.