Customer Service for Beginners

Customer Service for Beginners ©

By Michael Casey

Before I start I’ll ask you one question.

Why do we need customer service?

Answer:

We need customer service, GREAT customer service So that customers come back to us again and again.

BAD Customer Service means NO return customers.

Which in the end means WE ARE ALL OUT OF A JOB looking after great grandpa at home.

So please follow the ADVICE I’m sharing with you.

And before  you ask why should you listen to me, the answer to that is I’m paying you and I had the highest praise ever for my customer service when I worked at my previous job.

 I had maybe 100,000 customers,  I spoke to all of them.

Here’s the Advice, please commit it to memory so you know it as well as your favourite song.

1. Never say NO.

2. If a customer asks for black, and we don’t have it tell the customer what colours we DO have.

3. Then we don’t lose a sale

4.  Saying NO turns customers away and they look elsewhere.

5. So you ALWAYS tell them ALTERNATIVES, they can be  

  Persuaded, to make a PURCHASE, we have NOT lost a sale.

6. If you cannot give an answer for any reason, then tell the customer YOU WILL FIND OUT, Never say I don’t know.

7. Always be polite, especially with difficult customers, NEVER eat and drink while on the phone, they will think you are a PIG

8. Professionalism counts, so be professional, have a tidy desk and KNOW where to look on the computer, so you don’t APPEAR to be like a lost child.

9. Once you have an order ALWAYS REPEAT BACK to the customer what they have just ordered.

 Eg. So you say:- shirt size 10, pants size 12, and the COLOURS they want too, and the QUANTITIES. Most importantly their MAILING ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER

10. SO you have the order and ALL the details, what do you say before ending the CONVERSATION?

11. You say THANK YOU FOR YOUR ORDER PLEASE SHOP WITH  

      US AGAIN.

Never bad mouth customers as you hang up, because they WILL hear, and you should NEVER do it anyway.

12. ONE FINAL THING, BEFORE YOU HANG UP, Tell the customer we also have great offers on, whatever items there are offers on. AND tell them next week, or next month we will have more items. It would be EVEN BETTER if as you take their order you REMIND the customers about matching items etc.

13. Customer Service is all about giving the customer what they want, and if we don’t have it we offer ALTERNATIVES.

14. We wear makeup and nice clothes to attract a boy, and we  try and make him happy. OUR CUSTOMERS ARE THAT BOY.

15. If you are GOOD the customer tells 4 friends and we get more SALES.

16.If you are bad and lazy the customer tells 10 friends, and WE SUFFER and end up at home looking after great grandpa

SO SMILE EVEN WHEN ON THE PHONE AND ALWAYS GIVE GREAT 

CUSTOMER SERVICE, OFFER ALTERNATIVES ALWAYS

me during my 100,000 guest days

Dolls' House

Dolls’ House ©

By

Michael Casey

Well the Vet books arrived so we covered them in cling film, or rather sticky film to protect them, so they would be protected while my 13 year old spends a few years mulling over whether to become a Vet or not. The sticky stuff also arrived in the post, as part of the preschool materials for my daughter.

I remember maybe 45 years ago when my French teacher at grammar school got us all to cover our text books in clear sticky back plastic. One of the class had done his book in it and Mr Notzing noticed and decided it was a great idea, so he arrived one day with squares all pre-cut ready for us all to cover our books. I mention this because thanks to Mr Notzing I was good at French, a 20 question test every week for 4 years had also helped. So God Bless Mr Notzing, he died when he was about my age.

Now my small daughter had begged for a dolls’ house for a long time, she had one already but she wanted a bigger version. My brother had bought her the original dolls house as a Christmas present a few years ago. Finally she was allowed a cream coloured one, available from Sue Ryder via Amazon, and naturally made in China, but she is ½ Chinese herself.

We watched the post for it to arrive and then finally it did, my small daughter was delighted. So I just looked at my watch and said she had to read for 2 hours first and then do 15 minutes piano. She would be very good at piano but bored of it, but now at this moment the dolls’ house had power, so I used it.

Then I had to drag her away from the piano as I carried the heavy bundle upstairs to her bedroom. It looked as if it was all covered in sticky clear plastic itself, but it was no book, it was a dolls house. So we used a box cutter to get all the wrapping off, then I laid out all the pieces like an undertaker laying out the dead.

Front and back, roof and floors and so forth, I got my small daughter to count all the screws so we could know if we lost any. Then we began, I had guessed it would take an hour and a half to do, only I forgot about my bad back and my Arthur, my arthritis. So in the end it took 3 and a half hours.  Some of the screws were so small and fiddly so I could not fit them into place. So both my daughters did the small finger parts.

The new Sue Ryder dolls house was 4 times bigger than the original dolls house, and actually 25% cheaper in price, made of wood and not plastic too.  You have to use logic and spatial awareness, to work it all out. I was trying to explain it to my daughters as I went along, my big daughter did think about architecture as a career, before being a vet roared into her mind.

So we did the base and screwed the sides on, then we slotted in the 1^st floor, we were on a roll. The 2^nd floor came easy, we tightened it into position. Soon the roof would be on and the house was taking shape it looked so good already. Then we realised the 2^nd floor was on back to front, the pictograph was the evidence. So we had to undo all the screws and rotate it before putting the screws back into position.

Then we placed the 2 sets of stairs into position, the thing was taking shape. So I went downstairs to the fridge for a celebratory drink of cold blackcurrant and a visit to the bathroom. The back roof went on next, followed by putting the 2 attics on the front roof. So everything was coming up roses, my small daughter was getting happier and happier. As for my back and thighs, they were beginning to hurt, scrambling around on a bedroom floor exacts its price, especially if you have arthritis.

So we only had the front to put on, with hinges, and the front roof with more hinges. This is when things get tricky, the screws were tiny and my pork sausage fingers were not tiny. So the hinges were the girls’ job to do. I just supervised, as I went downstairs for another drink and to squeeze some painkilling gel on my back and hips. Building a dolls house has a price to pay for dads with Arthur, but a dad has to do what a dad has to do.

Then we worked out how to put the double jointed roof hinges on, though to be honest one was back to front so we had to redo it. Finally the roof was on, I would have done a victory lap around the bedroom, only my Arthur would not let me. The front had 4 hinges plus a magnet to close the front 2 pieces together. We managed to do it, even when we discover we were missing a few screws. 

Luckily I had a few spare in my stash of tools and screws. But we still lacked 2, my small daughter said it did not matter, but I insisted. I found a long thin nail and it was pressed into service, and with a few more blows of my hammer it was turned into a screw. But we still lacked one screw, one screw was missing. So we used a large drawing pin.

We closed everything, we had done it, we now had a super dupper dolls house, in fact it looks like one of the dream houses that I  look at on www.rightmove.co.uk If only I could win the Premium Bonds then I’d move to such a house. We decided on one more thing, the hinges could be helped if we added clear sticky back plastic to them and along the entire edges of the opening parts.

We moved the new dolls house into its final resting place, just in front of the girls’ wardrobe, which could now only open with one door. That did not matter, only the doll’s house mattered. My daughter gave me a big hug, it had taken 3.5 hours. I went downstairs to lie on the settee, while my daughter filled her doll’s house with all the Sylvanian family furniture.

We had done it, I would of course extract a price for this new dolls house, more piano and more reading. Though to be honest my small daughter does do loads of reading already, but if I can redirect her back to the piano for 15 minutes a day then that will be a victory for both of us. So we had a victory toast of fizzy orange Fanta, and then I rubbed my pain killer on my Arthur. 

Shanghai Pink

Shanghai Pink ©

By

Michael Casey

Well my girls got home yesterday morning, a groaning taxi arrived with them and all their treasure. I was standing on the doorstep as the black taxi tuned the corner, perfect timing. I had been watching flightaware so I knew all the details of their two flights from Shanghai, if you google it will tell you all about Daniel Baker the founder.

It’s so much easier if you fly from Birmingham, no waste of 3 hours going to Heathrow, and more especially when you return tired from holiday. However you do have to take a connecting flight, but at least you are not so tired when you get home.

Once home all the cases are dumped  in your clean home. I did actually vacuum and tidy up before their arrival, before my 3 girls came home to me. After 3 weeks, I needed too, I even did all the washing up too, and put all the cups and plates away, and I washed the kitchen floor too. None of this was noticed as my wife went online to tell her mum she had arrived safely, not to mention catching up on all her messages. Sometimes I think she needs a social secretary.

My small daughter was triumphant, she had a souvenir for me in her hand. A lucky cat, a fat cat on a red cushion with a bell around its neck, this now lives behind me, on top of the  bookcase next to the hifi. My small daughter also gave me a tiny rubber in the shape of a tiny white lucky cat. So I have 2 lucky cats now.

Next the bags are opened and the contents spill everywhere, and everywhere really does mean everywhere. They were allowed 69 kilos, so they brought back the full allocation. Ma, as I call grannie in Shanghai, sends things she’s saved. Such as 2 old shirts of mine and 2 pairs of nonmatching socks, and one old pair of blue underpants, all this saved for more than a decade, from my first ever visit to China.  

How and why these were saved I cannot remember, it may have been part of the leave something behind, which would mean I’d have to come back for my future bride. I did have to leave the Eurythmics  album 17 behind, I still play it often. The album returned to me many years ago, but the shirts and socks, and the blue pants must have been overlooked. The shirts would never fit again as my chest size is 2 inches bigger and my neck is an inch bigger, thanks to 3 years working in a hotel.

More treasure spills over the floor and covers the 2 settees we have in the living room, then the phone calls begin. My wife is very popular, so she has to catch up on 3 weeks news, but she had not seen her mum for 5 years, so there was lots of catching up to do.

Then slowly slowly, like a tide too slowly retreating all the stuff is unloaded from the suitcases and those plastic/canvas blue stripy bags that Chinese travellers use on their travels. Next all the packaging is thrown to one side, luckily I emptied the dustbins the day before. Where does all the stuff come from, ask anybody with an international wife and they will say the same.

This takes a period of hours, in between the phone calls, so the tide of unpacked suitcases retreats, with pockets of wet sand here and there, or rather piles of clothes balanced and slipping from the arms and backs of the twin sofas. Meanwhile twin dustbins are filling with stuff. Grannie has send loads of stuff back  to Birmingham, some of the stuff I don’t see as I take refuge in the front room, my PC being my saviour.

We stop for family pizza, my big daughter had decided to puke on the Shanghai to Paris flight, so she was starving now, though the Paris to Birmingham flight was nice. So my Shanghai/Birmingham family have pizza, it’s a change from 3 weeks of total Chinese food.

The washing machine is switched on and the first load is started, luckily I emptied the washing machine 2 days ago, I anticipated this. 90 minutes later the first surprise, a duvet set emerges, only its camouflage green, it’s what you’d use to hide a tank with, have we got Putin’s luggage by mistake?

So I hang out all the washing, ready for the next load. As I hang the camouflage green duvet cover, with matching pillow slips and mattress cover on the line I laugh. Ma, has sent this all this way, 5000 miles just in case we could use it. It’s very Irish really, not just Chinese, my own mum would have done the same. I hang out more washing only to discover that several items are now Shanghai Pink, an old red jumper that my wife had 10 years ago has landed up in Birmingham, mixed in with all the washing. So several items are now Shanghai Pink.

The washing was left out overnight, then early this morning I switched on the washing machine ready for the day’s sun, and the second load. As least Shanghai Pink would not be repeated. Then I went back to bed for another hour, I would rise with the rising sun, and get our 2^nd load done. We never use the tumble dryer, radiators yes, as they are free, tumbler dryer no. My wife has developed an English love of the Weather Forecast, sunshine is free too.

I rise and discover my wife on the phone, so I hang out the 2^nd load of washing, laughing at Putin’s washing as I take it off the line ready for the next load. I hang out another duvet set, Ma has sent this 5000 miles too. She did have her place redecorated a year or so ago and so we are getting her caste offs, though it turns out that the second duvet set was a new set, that was stuck at the back of the wardrobe, for 10 years.

Then Shanghai Pink reappears, where is the offending item this time? There are no red jumpers in the pile, but there are 3 sets of long-johns, what looks like a child’s long-johns, 3 tops and 3 pants. They are in fact the wife’s long-johns.  The Shanghai Pink is bigger this time, my wife comes outside to laugh. Thanks to her long-johns she never freezes in Winter, and always wonders why I’m cold, and tells me off for putting the heating on.

The sun shines and the 2^nd load of washing blows in the wind, even if  some of it is now Shanghai Pink in colour, inside the house gradually the tide of clothes and suitcases disappears, at least its only in one room now.

I remember I have a can of lager in the fridge so I enjoy that, upstairs there is noise, my wife has decided to have a tidy up. There’s no room in the wardrobes for the new stuff, so old stuff is exiled to downstairs. Just as I thought the house was tidy, the tide, the 2^nd tide of the day takes over, this time old and unloved clothes will be transported to the charity shop. But first they will mount up in plastic bags behind me, it’s my job to carry them to the charity shops.

Sadly 2 of the charity shops close by have closed, so I have to walk farther away to donate/ get rid of our old stuff. If you have daughters and they are under 16 they are still growing, so the amount of clothing that ends up in the charity shop can be quite large. I do have one daughter who takes after me, and the smaller daughter takes after my wife as far as build goes, which means more trips to the charity shop for me.

I could go on but I have to cook for the family now, so we are having pasta, Aldi pasta, two packets full in one big saucepan. I switch on, make sure it doesn’t over boil, and in 15 minutes I have fed the family. One thing is sure though, my pasta won’t be Shanghai Pink.

I want to be a Ghostwriter

I want to be a Ghostwriter ©

By Michael Casey

I’ve decided to be a Ghostwriter, it might be easier just to adopt a pen name but I think I’ll go all the way, there has to be a first time for everything. I mean if I am a ghostwriter nobody will know who I am. I can write horrible things about the man in the chip shop, he never gives me enough chips. I can write about that lolly pop lady who lets cars kill me, oh sorry love I did not see you. I wear bright red and I have silver hair.

But that’s more about the joys of having a pen name so you can be truly invisible, and really dig the knife in, all those people you hate, that man at the bus stop, or all those  driver bastards on mobile phones while you cross at the zebra crossings. Not to mention those who overtake a queue of stopped traffic at a zebra which you are crossing, just so they can try and kill me. It’s happened at least 5 times.

Well it’s good to get that out of my system, though I would like to vaporise all those bad drivers in the neighbourhood. I speak as a lifelong pedestrian and non-driver. So what would ghost writing be like? Would you meet lots of interesting people? I did when I was a concierge, would they have lots of good stories to share? And I’d get paid to tell them, for a good fee of course.

How much should you charge? £50 an hour and a minimum fee of £1000 up front, just to get rid of time wasters. How would they communicate their stories to you? One idea would be for them to record them then copy them to a usb stick which they’d post to you, with a cheque. If you like the story then you agree to write it for them. If you don’t then you keep the usb stick, and charge a £100 fee just for evaluation costs. If you like it they have to pay the £1000 up front.

If you google “fees for ghost writing” I’m sure you’ll get much higher costs.  You can also add on a 10% share of any book sale profits, plus if it’s optioned for a film you can ask 25% of film rights. It’s your writing that made the story interesting after all. So much for the theory, but did you know a film script writer gets 5% of the film budget, and a profit share, or so much for the theory.  

As for the writing, the ghost writing itself, it must be a story worth telling, you don’t want to be some sort of glorified copy typist. When I was copy typing my novel to have it on my computer, that was the most boring thing in the world, so instead I rewrote it and it doubled in size, humour and pathos.

So assuming you get a reply to your advert in the Daily Telegraph, it’s not really an advert, you posted a comment in the comment section and hoped somebody noticed. Then you make contact with somebody, or rather they contact you, and you sit there listening to the usb stick story. Every other word is, “you know, or init or erh, or I, I and I” people have to learn how to speak before they can learn how to write. Though I could teach people to Speak as well, see I am doubly gifted.

The trouble is people “think” they can speak, and then they think they can write. The truth is they cannot. To stand up and talk and hold and engage an audience does require training. I learnt to do it properly back in 1998, and the writing took me 1 year of doing it, with 20 years of constant listening to BBC Radio 4  BEFORE I picked up a pen.

I’ve gone sideways, so back to the ghost writing. You get a usb stick and you play it on your hifi, so it doesn’t get a chance of giving your computer a virus. You sit there with a can of Stella Artois in your hand, as you listen. You hear the accent and the tone, some accents are hard to understand, some just hurt your ears, like chalk on a blackboard, though I’m probably the last generation that knows about chalk and blackboards.

If the story is good you’ll put down the can of Stella and listen harder, as you listen your professional ear kicks in. When you watch a film, you enjoy the story and the way it’s acted, and you spot the telegraphed items. At the start is superglue, so that later in the story the superglue returns to save the day.

So the story is good, you just need to take out the cursing, yes it’s needed and it’s the way the story is, but less is more. Some kids think that saying %$£^ is clever, but when repeated 1000 times its just BORING. Same goes for the sex, less is more, if that’s a contradiction in terms. Jackie Collins is Jackie Collins or 50 Shades of Grey. So you listen and you see through to the heart and soul of the story. The teller may not be able to write nor even talk, but the ingredients make a very powerful story.

So you finish listening, you may have another Stella Artois or their new Cidre, then you sit in the chair thinking. Then you go to bed and sleep on it, literally. In the morning you write for an hour or two. You read it back, you’ve taking their story, their life and you’ve made it better, it’s a good piece of writing now.

As I write this I can remember once being asked did I ever write for others, I cannot remember when, that could have been my ghost writing chance. I was asked by a lawyer did I ever teach how to give a talk or was it writing. NOW today if either of those people is reading this I’d like to try both, but they are gone like ships in the night.

So back to the ghost writing, then you have to ring up or email the teller and ask them what they think of your writing. Have you make their life good, do you do justice to their story, to their life. It’s at this  moment you either get £100 for the evaluation, or they send you £1000. You never do a stroke more without payment. I have a friend a translator in Shanghai who was fleeced for a technical translation he had done. There are thieves out there, so trust nobody, this is work, even if it is work you love, you must be paid. And in advance.

Some people can write about anything and anybody, axe murderers and junkies, who don’t use trains but buses, all kinds of stuff. Or the life and times of the village organist. It can be either end of the spectrum. As a ghost writer you could be writing about anything, the guy interviewed on the BBC  claimed he got 3 offers a day. If he’s that lucky he can be choosey, very choosey, it said his books have sold 10,000,000 copies. 

How choosey would you be, would you be like a bar, open long hours to everybody, for everybody. Me, I wouldn’t be like that, I wouldn’t want to put up with an idea or a person for 3 months while I wrote the story. It’s like shop staff they have to put up with the likes of you and me, while they are working. Once outside the shop they can cross over the road to avoid us. So a story is like a uniform that you have to wear at work, you could really hate it. I had to wear a pink tie while I was a  concierge, I hated that tie.

You have to either like or at least tolerate the story and the teller, while you are ghost writing. Then once the work is done their name is on the front of the book, not yours. If you are lucky you may get a tiny credit. That’s why you must have a proper legal contract so that at least you get the money if not the praise for all your hard work.

So I hope all you would be ghost writers, and I include myself, have had food for thought by reading this piece. And as I said before I am available to teach public speaking and as a virgin ghost writer.

Ghost Writer Available

I just saw this guy being interviewed on "Meet the Author" on the BBC, I forget his name,but he is a Ghost Writer after all. So it got me thinking, perhaps that's what I should be. People may like my style but not the content, so perhaps I should just sell my style. I did actually get a radio station, a hip and trendy one, say "we like your style but not the content" Other Radio stations DO like my stuff, but getting a slot in a format driven Radio World is very hard, but I do keep on trying.

As for the Ghost Writer idea, if anybody out there wants to contact me then just send me an email with "Ghost Writer" in the subject line. Now if you want examples of my writing you can click on www.michaelgcasey.typepad.com  and  there in actual fact you can hear me READ OUT 50 or so examples. If you want to read more then just click http://www.amazon.co.uk/Michael-Casey/e/B00571G0YC 

 I have 8 books on Amazon. Just look for my face.

I do have an idea for a comic post about wanting to be a Ghost Writer, that'll be called "I want to be a Ghostwriter" So watch out for that.

We are all related in Paradise

We are all related in Paradise ©

By Michael Casey

Summer is the time for holidays, summer is also the time for delays. My wife and mother in law and our 2 daughters were stuck in Osaka due to the Typoon. Now they are about to land in Shanghai where they’ll finish their holiday. How China Eastern Airlines looks after stranded passengers is another matter, I won’t dwell on it, for now.

As for me I’m home alone in Birmingham so I’ve been using the internet to track the storm and to see how flights are affected. A few messages to the departure lounge and their camp bed made up of seats. I suppose afterwards my daughters will think it’s been a big adventure.

Back here in Birmingham we were awaiting the leftover hurricane Bertha, Big Bertha. My sister is planning to go to Chicago, so that’s to the West while my family is in the East the Far East. How would my sister’s planned trip be affected by the left over storm, she already had to wait a year for this trip.

Then I got thinking about my mother, she used to keep a bottle of Holy Water behind the side door, where the bread bin used to be, next to shoes and a row of coats hanging up, this is 45 years ago now. So if the storm was too much and she was afraid it would damage our roof she’d open the door up and sprinkle Holy Water, commanding the weather to calm down. Yes, Faith of a Child, it was this which I inherited when she died, because I needed it. And I never cried when she died either. My dad, I cried like a puppy dog beaten with an iron bar.

So in Paradise my mother is watching over us and sees the storm, Bertha is bearing down on England, mum’s youngest child’s holiday plans could be delayed. She has to get to Dublin first for the Chicago flight, the weather could delay her. So imagine what my mum does, any mum would do.

Reaching inside her smock, the blue one she always wore around the house, the smock she was wearing the last time I saw her alive, mum brings out a ten gallon container of Holy Water. Freshly filled that morning from the stream that runs through the garden of Eden. Paradise is the garden of Eden, didn’t you all know that. Mum drenches Bertha from on high and says, that’s enough, be still now. As I speak Birmingham has sunshine.

Besides mum a Chinaman appears and knocks her elbow, he apologises, my mum answers in perfect Shanghai dialect. The Chinaman is impressed, how did she manage that? He is speaking in a Kerry accent, a strong one at that. They both look confused, then they smile. God does work in mysterious ways after all.

My daughter is going to Chicago, my daughter is bringing my 2 granddaughters to Shanghai. Mum looks down and smiles. They continue speaking, mum in Shanghai dialect and the Chinaman in a very thick Kerry accent. The Chinaman reveals that his daughter has a Birmingham husband. My mum says she lived in Birmingham. They exchange pleasantries as mum magics up tea and Madeira cake, our Sunday treat when we were small.

It’s then that mum realised they are her granddaughters too, she jumps for joy, she never ever saw them when she was alive, she died too early for it to happen. She has 2 granddaughters, her son got married and had 2 daughters. Why didn’t she know that before? She reaches into her smock and produces 2 ten gallon containers of Holy Water, together they pour them over the Typhoon over Japan.

My dad appears, he’s had his bacon and eggs breakfast, mum shouts excitedly, we have 2 granddaughters, ½ Shanghai granddaughters. I know said dad, I held one in my arms before I came to join you here in the Garden of Eden. Why didn’t you tell me? I forgot.

Paradise is a strange place, it’s like a bouncy castle for kids, everybody is so happy and there is fizzy pop too, and Cadbury’s chocolate everywhere, Cadbury’s Crunchie is everywhere, growing from the trees next to the apples.

So the Chinaman calls all his relatives over, did they know they all have Irish relatives. Mum calls over all the generations of the Kerry family, and did they know they had Chinese family. Everybody is happy, the Chinese all speak with really thick Kerry accents. All the Irish speak Shanghai dialect. Everybody is happy, they have thousands of years of family stories to share. Mum pulls out a 20 gallon container, this time it’s Poteen, another type of holy water.

They all look down, 2 storms have abated, so they can enjoy their drink. What do Chinese/Irish family talk about? They talk about their grandchildren of course, and best of all you can drink as much Poteen as you like and you don’t get drunk, happy yes, drunk no. 

Another day in Paradise.

 a few photos to amuse you.

Autism The World needs all kinds of minds

AUGUST 6TH, 2014 18:18

Autism The World needs all kinds of minds

By michaelgcasey

There was an interview on the BBC 5 O’Clock news it was about Autism, the interviewee said just google Temple Grandin

So I did and I was very impressed and touched by the video. I’ll be googleing more now.

But for all readers of this just click the link, it could change your life

http://www.ted.com/talks/temple_grandin_the_world_needs_all_kinds_of_minds