Sunday newsagency management tip: train your employees

Too often I hear newsagents criticise employees for decisions they have made and mistakes in dealing with customer situations when the criticism more fairly rests back with the employer for poor leadership. By poor leadership I mean lack of training or the absence of a policy.

Unless your employees know what you want them to do or how you want them to handle any situation, what they actually do may be more on you than on them.

Here are some everyday queries for which you need to provide training or have a policy and suggested processes:

1. A customer returns a product without a receipt. 
   1. Ask the customer when they purchased the item. Use your software to list instances when the item was purchased. Ask the customer roughly the time of the purchase. Find tin the list on the screen. Ask the customer the method of payment used. If that matches you are good to go, if not – say you will keep the item and have the owner contact them. If your software it is easy to find previous purchases based on an item in the purchase.
2. A customer asks where they can purchase something you do not have and you know a competitor has the item.
   1. If it is a direct competitor near you say sorry, we can;t help.
3. A customer complains they were given the wrong change.
   1. Go to your CCTV footage.
4. A customer breaks an item.
   1. They pay for it.
5. A customer asks you to put something aside for them.
   1. Use your computer system to get name, address, mobile number and an id (usually driver’s licence) code.

There are many more customer encounters you could cover. Us you do not train every employee, if you do not have appropriate policies, what your employees do comes down to common sense and you cannot expect them to share your common sense.