Customer Service: The Backbone of Guernsey

No company exists without customers, making providing great customer service experiences one of THE most important elements of any successful business. While great customer service should be a no-brainer for any company, at Guernsey, we don’t stop at ‘good.’ We consistently aim for exceptional.

Providing exceptional customer service drives us. It’s integral to who we are as a brand and as a team. Because it’s so much a part of who we are and what we offer, we want to take a moment to talk more about it. We also want to shine a spotlight on the amazing people in our customer service department who are responsible for providing it. They are superstars who show up and exceed expectations on the regular, and we think it’s vital to recognize the excellent work they do and sing their praises.

What Sets Guernsey’s Customer Service Apart

Our approach to customer service can be broken down into two sentences:

“Guernsey values our customers” and “Guernsey’s Customer Service Team is valuable.”

Everything we do is in service to both of those statements.

Our CEO, David Guernsey, always likes to say, customer service representatives have the incredible ability to “smile through the phone.” But being friendly is only half of the equation. You also need to provide solutions. And we are proud to say our customer service representatives at Guernsey do both in spades.

We focus on providing:

• Multiple channels to communicate through – email, phone, and a chat feature built into all our websites – with real people providing real answers.
• Knowledgeable representatives who can answer questions about orders and account information or direct you to the precise people who can help you if they don’t have the answers themselves.
• Open to feedback and willingly implement necessary changes to improve services, products, and processes
• Punctuality and efficiency
• Empathy

We’re going to break down those points a bit more.

Real People Offering Real Solutions in Real Time

A lot of companies (too many, in our opinion) outsource their customer service to AI or people simply unfamiliar with the business and services offered. Not us. We have real humans on the other end of the line, ready to answer emails and calls and provide our clients with solutions. And if they can’t, they’ll either find the answer or direct you to someone who can. No automatic systems that erroneously lead you through an endless loop… just people trying their best to help our customers and users.

Not only are they available, but they are also efficient and punctual with replies. And, of course, they offer friendly professionalism every step of the way!

We make it easy to reach us as well, offering multiple channels to communicate through – email, phone, and a chat feature built into all our websites. If you have a question or a concern, you have plenty of ways to reach out to us, and someone from our staff will be there ready to help.

Empowering Our Team

We believe in our employees. We also know none of us know everything, which is why we have a company culture that empowers and supports our customer service team. They know that if they don’t have an answer, they have a staff willing and available to help them find one. Any questions or concerns they can’t solve themselves is forwarded to the appropriate team members in Account Management, Category Management, Accounting, and IT, who will happily help in any way they can. Our customer service team knows we have their back. As the saying goes, teamwork makes the dream work. That’s us.

Customer Feedback Really Matters

While we do our best to be our best and provide the best every day, we are also human and occasionally we get it wrong. And if we do, we want to make it right. That’s why we love and welcome feedback. Yes, even the negative kind. Good feedback energizes us, for sure. But bad feedback inspires us to find newer and better ways to do things. No one likes to hear they’ve not met expectations, but we’d rather know and then be able to do something about it than have no idea something went wrong and continue to do it unwittingly.

We have a kind of open-door policy when it comes to feedback. In fact, we routinely provide surveys or ask customers for their level of satisfaction about everything, from our drivers to our Account Managers to our product availability and beyond. Any feedback we get is always passed on to upper management to be used to improve our presence and processes. When we say we care about our customers, it’s not just talk. Our customers’ experience truly matters to us.

Reactive AND Proactive

Good customer service is not just about being reactive. It’s also about being proactive. We work to stay on top of our business, which helps us know exactly who and what is affected if something goes wrong somewhere. It also means we can work quickly to solve the issues and put our customers at ease. We pride ourselves on being as proactive as we are reactive, and we are swift when it comes to addressing any problems that come our way. Whenever we can shield our customers from the negative effects of a delay in delivery or some other sort of setback, we do.

The Value of Empathy

Empathy should be obvious as a necessity for good customer service, but it’s all too often overlooked. We are humans dealing with humans. We all have bad days. When something isn’t going right, people get frustrated and angry. Providing good customer service means taking that into consideration and being understanding and patient. We are pleased to say our customer service representatives have solidified a stellar reputation for being kind and thoughtful people who go above and beyond for our customers.

From the Mouths of Our Customers

We love our customer service reps and think the world of them and the work they do, which makes it easy for us to celebrate them. But you don’t have to take it from us. Over 200 of our customers were kind enough to fill in a recent survey about their experiences working with us, and the results speak for themselves. Over 98% of the survey participants ranked Guernsey’s Customer Satisfaction as easy or very easy.

At Guernsey, People Come First

Guernsey’s EVP and CRO, Gordon Thrall, sums it up: ‘We provide high quality customer service by leveraging technology and engaging people in ways that result in the most satisfying outcome for the person seeking support. Offering access to knowledgeable, helpful people who can listen to fully understand a problem, and then effect the best solution, is what truly distinguishes our service levels from our competitors.”

As a trusted supplier of supply chain and procurement management services with clients from Virginia Beach, VA to Harrisburg, PA, we bring a personal, small business feel to a wide range of communities. We love our customers and truly appreciate that they choose us when it comes to supplying their workplace and workforce, which is why we are so committed to ensuring we provide them with customer service that goes above and beyond at every opportunity. If you’re a government office, educational institution, healthcare facility, corporate workplace, or restaurant looking for exceptional customer service, see what our current customers our saying.