Keeping Customers Informed

I would rather fly with Virgin Atlantic than with British Airways, and I would rather ski at Mammoth than at Heavenly. That's not necessarily because Virgin have better timekeeping (we were mighty delayed last week, for example), nor that skiing is better at Mammoth than at Heavenly. It all comes down to accurate and full customer information.

At Mammoth, there's a clock on every ski lift to tell you the time; at Heavenly, timepieces are few and far between. Lift information at Mammoth has tended to be accurate ... but here at Heavenly, the online web site seems to tell us what they wish they could be running rather than what they are running. Yesterday, one of their few on-mountain report displays beside "Groove" chair told it was shut down ... no one had told the operators, and it was running!

"What shall we tell the customers?" was an often asked question at the place I used to train under contract when they were cancelling a course or had rescheduled dates. "What's wrong with telling them the truth?" was my reaction. Customers deserve the respect of full and honest information.

I'm off in a few minutes to Heavenly's Gondola station. Signage there is very limited, and the web site tells me that all the lifts (bar one) are open today. Sorry, I don't believe the web site. Experience over the last couple of days tell me that I need to seek out one of their staff and chat with him to find out what's really happening. What a silly system!

And we disagree with it. Hence...

Well House Consultants information updates:

Headline news digest on our news page
Daily update via the Horse's Mouth
News flashes on our home page
Customer support via the Opentalk Forum
.... and course availability on our booking system and in our diary is dynamic.
(written 2006-01-02, updated 2008-06-10)

Associated topics are indexed under

G501 - Well House Consultants - Customer Service
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  [3835] The Information age - not yet truly with us? - (2012-08-12)
  [3808] Can you put names to faces? - (2012-07-19)
  [3378] New product - ensuring that supply matches demand - (2011-08-03)
  [3294] It's not just about the jam in the sandwich - (2011-05-19)
  [3271] The importance of feedback - (2011-04-30)
  [3103] Thank you - and Happy Christmas - (2010-12-24)
  [3073] Customer Service - the boundary - (2010-11-27)
  [2961] Initial handling of phone calls and walk in visitors - (2010-09-19)
  [2880] Getting in touch - Please allow me to see you when you are online - (2010-07-21)
  [2650] Getting a phone line changed ... - (2010-02-25)
  [2530] Taking a knock over Santa - (2009-12-08)
  [2258] Questions I have been asked on answering the phone - (2009-06-26)
  [2236] Alumni - revisiting and supporting the old University - (2009-06-13)
  [2124] Building down expectations - (2009-04-09)
  [2102] What do people think of our Apache httpd / Tomcat course? - (2009-03-24)
  [2049] Why Choose Well House Consultants for your course? - (2009-02-20)
  [2015] Service Excellence Awards - (2009-01-30)
  [1991] Rules for a King - (2009-01-13)
  [1985] Learning to program as a part of your job - (2009-01-10)
  [1835] 23:30 bookings and midnight checkins - (2008-10-12)
  [1637] Providing exceptional service - and carrying on doing so. - (2008-05-09)
  [1606] Sheep Shearers, Marathon Runners and Ocean Sailors - (2008-04-09)
  [1516] Pictures you can use - for free - from our library - (2008-01-23)
  [1446] An answer to a student asking 'Help' - (2007-11-27)
  [1434] Market survey - to learn, to prove a point, or to sell your product? - (2007-11-17)
  [1319] Customer feedback - lifeblood of a business - (2007-08-25)
  [1262] Keep in touch with PHP, Perl, Python and old friends too - (2007-07-09)
  [1046] Bounce, bounce, bounce - (2007-01-20)
  [1007] Friends and family - (2006-12-25)
  [966] CSL, KISS and RTFM - (2006-12-05)
  [961] Products that our customers want more of - (2006-12-03)
  [944] Just ******* Google it - (2006-11-25)
  [852] Eventful evening - a lesson in looking after contacts - (2006-09-02)
  [841] Forum help - a push in the right direction - (2006-08-21)
  [725] Better communication - (2006-05-19)
  [717] A customer service company - (2006-05-11)
  [650] A person of few words - (2006-03-18)
  [628] Active Learning - (2006-02-28)
  [621] And the staff put the icing on the cake - (2006-02-23)
  [609] Been on a course, but still not got it? - (2006-02-16)
  [569] Instructions for bright people - (2006-01-19)
  [566] May all your screw-ups be big ones - (2006-01-16)
  [482] Different ways of selling - (2005-11-01)
  [440] Upgrade! - (2005-09-09)
  [393] Trainer answers phone - (2005-07-28)
  [350] Want to be one better - (2005-06-17)
  [327] How far should our support go - (2005-05-28)
  [265] Business practise, 2005 style - (2005-04-03)
  [233] Giving customers best value - (2005-03-02)
  [195] Customer service - examples to warn us - (2005-01-30)
  [189] Tuesdays and Fridays - (2005-01-25)
  [150] Confession - (2004-12-13)
  [126] Feedback shows the tip of an iceberg - (2004-11-22)
  [91] On line every 24 hours - (2004-10-17)
  [72] On Customer Service - (2004-10-03)

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