The biggest nuisance: a customer

You’ve got a big event scheduled for the business, maybe a visiting dignitary to the town who has been cajoled into visiting your new premises, and, just as the car is scheduled to pull up in front, an ordinary customer arrives and wants to talk about a possible order. What do you do? It’s such an obviously likely event, at least in my mind, but it seems the possibility had not struck the minds of the local branch of a major service provider when my wife and myself drove into their car park recently. They just seemed not to know what to do. As their minds creaked, we become uncomfortable and decided we just wanted to leave -- which we did. Admittedly it was not your everyday purchase, but it was one we had been thinking about for a long time: prepaid funerals. The first place we called at, in the middle of a weekday afternoon, was deserted; not only deserted but with a heavy iron grill across the entrance. Inside we could see the office door and there was a notice stuck on it but we’d have needed considerably stronger lenses in our prescription spectacles to read it. Next place at least had signs of life with a single car out front and a tall thin man standing on the verandah. “We’d like to talk to someone about prepaid funerals,” I said. His mouth opened but it was a while before any words came out: “We’re about to conduct a funeral”. I waited for some suggestion. Three considerably better built men appeared in the doorway. I can’t be sure now but they seemed to be rubbing their hands together, though whether in the manner of Dickens’ Uriah Heap or of characters from a mobster movie I’m not sure. I definitely did not hear any knuckles crack. “Can we help you?” the leader said. I repeated our request. “He’d been told we’re about to conduct a funeral” said a voice behind (presumably the thin man) stating what was true, though that had been no more than two seconds earlier. I began to feel a retreat was necessary. I half heard a comment about the room they’d use being in use, which might have made sense to them, but by now we were heading for the car. In my haste to exit I forgot that to open all doors on our car you have to press the keypad twice, so as what was presumably the first attendees for the funeral arrived, I realised my wife was still holding the door handle. By the time I reacted the incoming car had parked and as we started to reverse I realized we had to wait for an elderly lady on a walking frame to  be helped across to the parlour. By now it all seemed to be in agonizingly slow motion but eventually we were on our way. I had learned my lesson. Unlike the funeral directors I used to know where, as a cub reporter I’d call in and be handed a coffee by the undertaker’s wife while I learned who had died and who would and would not appreciate being asked questions by the media, today’s deaths are initially planned entirely by phone. Should a would-be customer actually call in, it seemed you will not be welcome. Am I alone in feeling there should be some more personal service as a first contact? However, since then I’ve realised that an increasing number of service businesses expect the phone to ring, to the extent that the walk-in customer is not really wanted, and must at least stand aside and wait if the phone rings. Business owners in the service area in general might do well to stand in their own reception area and see just how the walk-in client is received. More info on dealing with customers in the book written jointly by Geoffrey Heard and myself: Success in Store