Complaints arrive, get logged and get closed. Response time targets are mostly met. Yet customers who complain still leave, the same problems keep recurring, and your teams spend their days resolving issues that should never have happened twice.
A complaint is a moment of truth. Handled well, it can leave a customer more loyal than one who never had a problem at all. Handled as a case to be closed, it erodes trust and teaches you nothing. This review examines how your organisation handles complaints from first contact to resolution, and whether anything is learned along the way.
Is this your Organisation?
- CX CONSULTANCY
Complaint and Service Recovery Review
Stop losing customers at the point of failure.
WHAT THE DIAGNOSTIC COVERS
Six dimensions of complaint and recovery
Your complaint handling is assessed against the elements that separate genuine service recovery from a process that simply closes cases.
01
ACCESS
Ease of complaining
How easily a dissatisfied customer can raise an issue, across which channels, and how many simply leave rather than tell you at all.
03
RECOVERY
Service recovery
How well you put things right: the speed, fairness and authority to recover, and whether the front line is empowered to act without escalation.
05
LEARNING
Learning and prevention
Whether what you learn feeds back into prevention, so the same failures stop recurring, or whether each complaint is handled in isolation.
02
HANDLING
Front-line handling
How complaints are received and worked, the tone and ownership shown, and whether the first person to hear the issue can do anything about it.
04
ROOT-CAUSE
Root-cause analysis
How complaints are categorised and analysed, and whether you can see the recurring causes beneath the individual cases.
06
OWNERSHIP
Governance and measurement
Who owns complaint handling, how it is measured beyond response time, and how it connects to operational and strategic decision making.
HOW IT WORKS
A focused engagement, run with your team
01
Scope
A short scoping conversation to agree focus and access.
03
Interview
Interviews across the complaints lead, the front line, operations and the executive sponsor. In some cases, with the client's agreement, customers may also be interviewed.
02
Review
A review of complaint data, categorisation, process documentation and a sample of recent cases.
04
Read out
Assessment against the framework, followed by a findings session with your team.
A written assessment of your complaint handling against each of the six dimensions, with a redesigned recovery process and a clear target state. Presented in an executive readout, so the findings land with the people who can act on them.
WHAT YOU RECEIVE
The Service Recovery Framework
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A rating against each of the six dimensions
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A clear view of where trust is being lost and customers leave
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A redesigned recovery process, with front-line authority defined
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Root-cause categorisation that feeds prevention, not just reporting
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An executive readout to align your team