When the customer knows more than the employee
So my wife wanted to save our family some time over the weekend when she went to return a few things at Walmart. So she decided to use their app to start the return process on our way to the store. She figured this would save time and she'd be able to zip in and out quick.
Once she got there the employee in returns said that it looks like she'd already made the return in their system, even though my wife still had the items that needed to be returned in her hands. The employee and manager didn't know how to make a change in the system in order to actually physically return the items, but said that her account would be credited the money. So in the end after trying to do what Walmart's app said would save time, she probably spent about 30 minutes in the store trying to return the items.
And... then she walked out of the store with all of the items still in hand, because they couldn't return them. We did get our money back, but we also got 2 extra lamps that we have no use for. Anybody want one?
So what's the lesson here? When you offer the customer a solution to save time, make sure you have a plan to make sure it saves your customer time. In this example not only did the plan take more time, it cost the store money and left the customer frustrated because what was recommended didn't result in the outcome it said it would... saving time.
Once she got there the employee in returns said that it looks like she'd already made the return in their system, even though my wife still had the items that needed to be returned in her hands. The employee and manager didn't know how to make a change in the system in order to actually physically return the items, but said that her account would be credited the money. So in the end after trying to do what Walmart's app said would save time, she probably spent about 30 minutes in the store trying to return the items.
And... then she walked out of the store with all of the items still in hand, because they couldn't return them. We did get our money back, but we also got 2 extra lamps that we have no use for. Anybody want one?
So what's the lesson here? When you offer the customer a solution to save time, make sure you have a plan to make sure it saves your customer time. In this example not only did the plan take more time, it cost the store money and left the customer frustrated because what was recommended didn't result in the outcome it said it would... saving time.