[1]Two of the biggest frustrations for customers is receiving poor service post sale and not being understood. For a business the hard work shouldn’t stop with securing the client but should continue to ensure that they see your business as a value add.
Regardless of which market you’re in there’s always a great attention to detail in product development, driven through market insight and customer trends. Whilst the ‘tangible asset’ is of course extremely valuable to meeting client needs, often what is overlooked is the ongoing support and guidance that a client needs.
Products and services are designed by experts in a particular field who are already familiar and confident with their own business environment. For example, how many times have you been into a mobile phone shop only to be baffled by some of language and confusing tariffs available? They think they are being clear.
So how can you bridge the gap between being a trusted expert with technical competence but still deliver exceptional and valued customer service?
If you look at our product it isn’t tangible; it’s a piece of paper providing a promise that when needed can be used to cover some of the costs associated with bringing a legal action and that action subsequently failing.
What’s equally as important as the promise we provide is the expertise of our people who are available to answer any questions or queries our business partners have.
Being able to listen to and respond with sound reasoning is a real skill which I think our customers need. As an insurer, we’re in business to recognise, understand and manage risk as well as provide financial protection.
For our solicitor partners, it’s important that we recognise each other’s strengths and ‘what we bring to the table’ so we can positively utilise our respective skill sets for the good of our businesses and that of the customer.
We are not here to challenge or get into an intellectual debate around the legal merits of a case, our solicitor partners train for many years to be experts in the field of law. What we bring though, is an additional risk based view which may assist the lawyer in looking at a case in a different way.
Unfortunately we’re not able to insure every enquiry that comes across our desks (where the authority to bind us to risk isn’t delegated), but what we do is listen to try and understand the case and explain clearly our rationale if we decide not insure the risk.
It’s impossible to be ‘all things to all men’ but at least our business partners have a clear route to finding an expert willing to listen, question and understand, even if the outcome isn’t always favourable.