7. Voice of Customer

Wants, opinions, perceptions and desires. A standardized, disciplined and cyclical approach to obtaining and prioritizing customer preferences.

CRMS -- Customer Relationship Management System: Complaint Resolution, Feedback, Guarantees, Corrective Action

Complaints Handling System: ISO 10002:2004 Quality management — Customer satisfaction — Guidelines for complaints handling in organizations; Process of complaints handling related to products within an organization, including planning, design, operation, maintenance and improvement.

Aspects of Complaints Handling: enhancing customer satisfaction by creating a customer-focused environment that is open to feedback (including complaints), resolving any complaints received, and

enhancing the organization's ability to improve its product and customer service; top management involvement and commitment through adequate acquisition and deployment of resources, including personnel training; recognizing and addressing the needs and expectations of complainants; providing complainants with an open, effective and easy-to-use complaints process; analysing and evaluating complaints in order to improve the product and customer service quality; auditing of the complaints-handling process; reviewing the effectiveness and efficiency of the complaints-handling process.

Guidance for Businesses: Steps to setting up and maintaining a complaints-handling process: Be open to complaints: Information about how and where to complain should be well publicized to customers, personnel // “Your satisfaction is important to us, please tell us if you are not satisfied — we'd like to put it right”. // Collect and record complaints // Acknowledge your receipt of the complaint to the complainant if it is not received in person (a phone call or e-mail is sufficient). // Assess the complaint for validity, possible impact and who is the best person to deal with it; criteria: severity, safety implication, complexity, impact, and the need and possibility of immediate action. // Resolve as soon as practically possible, or further investigate the complaint and then make decision about what to do about it, and act promptly. // Give information to the customer about what you intend to do about the complaint, and evaluate the customer's response. Is it likely that the action will satisfy the customer? If yes, then move rapidly to take the action the customer reasonably expects, bearing in mind the best practices within your industry. // When all possible has been done in your view to resolve the complaint, tell the customer and record the outcome. If the complaint is still not resolved to the customer's satisfaction, explain your decision and offer any possible alternative actions. // Review complaints regularly — a brief periodical review and a more intensive annual review — to establish if there are any trends, or obvious things you could change or put right to stop complaints occurring, improve customer service, or make customers more satisfied.

Responses to complaints: refunds,replacement,repair/rework,substitutes,technical assistance, information,referral,financial assistance, or other assistance,compensation,apology,goodwill gift or token, and indication of changes in products, process, policy or procedure due to complaints.

House of Quality/ QFD: QFD means: Understanding customer needs // What 'value' means to the customer // Understanding how customers or end users become interested, choose, and are satisfied // Analyzing how do we know the needs of the customer // Deciding what features to include // Determining what level of performance to deliver.

1. Customer needs: prioritized customer needs

2. Competitive comparison: customer rating of key competitors’ performance

3. Measures: customer requirements measures (CTQs)

4. Relationships: relationship of CTQs to customer needs

5. Technical evaluation: actual performance of competitors on measures

6. Targets: performance required to meet CTQs/ needs

7. Correlation: correlation between the measures