Tim Almond

There are 2 reasons that I shop at John Lewis. 1) Service. 2) Price. It’s interesting how often I talk to people who assume that the upmarket department store chain is somehow expensive. Which isn’t to say that they don’t have some items that are really expensive (like the full-size ice cream maker that I’m currently coveting); it just means that when they do have items, they’re rarely more expensive. Like the time I bought a Dyson from them it was at a lower price than most national retailers because a small shop in Bristol had it discounted.

Recently, the service side was required. We had a problem with our John Lewis own brand dishwasher. There’s actually nothing wrong, just that we received a safety recall letter to the effect that there might be a problem, stop using it, an engineer will come out and check it over. So, we book it in, and then the engineer (from a 3rd party) doesn’t turn up on the day. We’re not happy bunnies about this, get onto John Lewis and they run around and we get an engineer out to us for another date (terribly sorry, sir - we’ll absolutely make sure that he comes out etc.). They dealt with the whole situation professionally. No problem with the dishwasher, all sorted etc. And then for our trouble, they sent us a bunch of gift vouchers (two more lights lit on the Gelato Chef totaliser).

Mistakes happen. Sometimes, the first rectification doesn’t work out. But it’s how companies deal with things that matter. I’ve had faults from a number of my favourite suppliers, and in each case, they dealt with it, and I’m still shopping with them. Customer service is not a cost. Every customer that you annoy is a) going elsewhere b) telling their friends about the experience.

Tags: Business //