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An Unhappy CustomerMany years ago, I had just joined a company and one of my first tasks was to deal with a VERY unhappy customer who wasn't paying his bill. There are several lessons to be learned from this tale. I should also note that I left that company, partially because of the kind of behavior that I describe below. Since I was the new guy, I could meet with the customer without the baggage that others in the company had accumulated. So the meeting was set at their office, and I walked into the lion's den. There were several people there. A consultant, who was supposed to have coordinated the project, but hadn't done his job very well and was embarrassed. The office manager, who had made some mistakes, and was now blaming us (not without cause). And the owner, who was upset because the system he thought he was getting for $15,000 wasn't what he had been expecting. In our conversation, which was somewhat adversarial in tone, despite my "new guy" status, it came out that the customer was upset about two things. They felt that the engineer, who had been assigned to them, wasn't particularly qualified. The other problem was that the sales rep had promised some functionality that couldn't possibly be delivered based on the system they purchased, or the money they spent. By the time I had gotten involved, this thing had dragged on for 6 months. When I walked out of the account, I had half of what they "owed" us. But it was better than nothing. Unfortunately, the customer only had half of what they were expecting. Now they had to go to another vendor to get the functionality that had driven the purchase in the first place. There is no question that my company had screwed up. The sales rep had really blown it, and we insisted on assigning the wrong engineer. However, the customer could have done a few things differently, to keep us in line and to avoid such a mess and waste of their money. 1. The sales rep promised them capabilities that were not in the proposal or any other correspondence. Not only was it his word against theirs, it was a complicated enough issue that I'd have wanted to see the EXACT commitment anyway. NEVER accept a promise or commitment that is not in writing. It doesn't have to be in a formal contract, but it does need to be documented, in an email, letter, etc. 2. This situation dragged on too long. The sales rep tried to keep the lid on the situation for as long as he could. When I finally got involved, no one could (or would) remember the details of what was said or what had happened. If you've got a problem, demand that it get resolved immediately. 3. They didn't have a relationship with the president of our company. And this particular guy was so insulated that just demanding to talk to him wouldn't have helped. They should have met the president during negotiations, discussed the project with him, and built a relationship. That way, they could easily have bypassed the rep to get any problems resolved. And the rep would have been more motivated to deal with any issues immediately, since he'd know that they had the president's business card in their Rolodex. But fundamentally, these problems wouldn't have occurred if they had been dealing with the president from the beginning. 4. The price was too low. Because they were upset with the rate the sales rep had negotiated, they insisted on assigning the least talented of our engineers. This resulted in substandard performance and customer unhappiness. Rather than firing the sales rep, they punished the customer. Makes sense, doesn't it? The customer could not have seen this coming. They merely negotiated in good faith and got a cheap rate. They could have avoided this if they'd shopped the deal around, and seen what the market was for this particular job. They would then have been suspicious of the lowball rate. In addition, if they had been dealing with the president at the start, this never would have happened. 5. My company had never done this kind of technology before. The customer didn't even ask for references, let alone check them. If we had had some experience, the sales rep probably wouldn't have said that this particular functionality would be part of the solution. While the company (I've long since left them) screwed up, the problems could easily have been avoided if the customer had met with the president, gotten everything in writing, shopped around, and checked references. This makes sense, but you'd be surprised at how many people don't do this. Don't depend on the vendor to do the right thing. If they can, they will. But you must remember that their motivation is to make money by selling you products or services. There are some basic things you can do to make sure you get what you pay for. Remember that a successful project is YOUR responsibility.
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