Is One on One always best?

Nowadays companies are clambering all over themselves to shout about their great customer service, the fact that their customers are not just a number, that nobody is just a "sausage in a sausage factory". From personal experience I can't stand it when I call up a company and nobody knows who I am or has any record of me having called before. This is especially frustrating when you pay them good money!

Lots of banks have jumped onto the "personal relationship manager" band wagon - you can have their mobile phone number, their direct line, their home address and their credit card for emergencies (alright, I made the last couple up but you get the gist). The thing is, the mobile number is a work mobile and will be switched off at 5pm sharp and their direct dial will be picked up by their voicemail because they are off meeting the other 150 customers with whom they have a "personal relationship". Very useful!

Now don't get me wrong, I am a great believer in customer service as a number one priorty, but has nobody noticed that in their efforts to achieve a "personal relationship" they are actually alienating a large part of their client base who, for the most part, just want a quick answer when they have a question.

When we were looking at our customer service model for Mazuma it quickly became apparent that having a single point of contact just wasn't a good idea. It's vitally important that people have access to someone who can answer technical questions about their accounts when they need it. But does this mean that it should always be the same person?

My personal opinion is that, no, it shouldn't have to be. At Mazuma, in each of our teams we have 2 or 3 people who know each client's work inside out. This is for a few reasons (which I won't bore you with now), but in terms of customer service, it's so that you'll always have someone to talk to, even if the team manager is on holiday for two weeks, or unexpectedly off sick, or on maternity or paternity leave. Not only does this mean that you have the reassurance that three qualified staff are looking at your work regularly (a sort of accountancy quality control if you will...), but it also means that you can count on there being someone to help you out when you need it. Marvellous!

Of course, not everybody likes this idea, but I regularly put this question to those people when challenged on this set up:

"So if your requested single point of contact was on annual leave for two weeks, would you happily wait two weeks for your question to be answered?"

In 100% of cases the answer is a resounding "No!".

A single point of contact is not a stable customer service model, but small teams who know your story in depth are.

I rest my case!