4 Ways to Handle a Difficult Customer

Customer handling has become one of major challenge in today’s competitive world. It requires lot of patience and positive attitude from the retailers’ side. The Retail Jeweller brings about 4 exciting stories shared by the jewellers about their customer experiences.

 —Manoj Chakraborty

A dissenting opinion

Six months ago, two ladies walked in, one of whom was reluctant to buy diamonds from us as she felt that we have high rates. She even advised her friend not to buy diamond jewellery from us, advising her that a branded jewellery showroom will give better rates. I convinced her to see our diamond pendant sets. Meanwhile, the dissenting customer told us to figure out the price of her diamond pendant. She was astonished to find that she was charged higher than the actual price and apologized for her behaviour. The lady is now a regular at our store.

Rahul Gupta, Owner, Gobardhanram Ramashish Pd and Co, Muzzafarpur, UP

The hard bargainer

Last month, two old customers walked in to buy diamond jewellery and finalized a pair of diamond earrings but started bargaining during the billing process. The final bill was Rs 34,000 but the customers told the staff that the jewellery rates are less in other stores. We failed to convince them for almost two hours and had to lower the price to Rs 30,000.

Anil Kumar Modi, Proprietor, Modi Jewellers, Hyderabad

The mistrusting consumer

During the recent wedding season, an old customer of mine came to our shop for his daughter’s wedding. Selections were done when his children started comparing our designs/charges/purity with that of a famous chain jeweller. I explained the benefits of a family jeweller over a corporate brand and convinced them for that. Now the daughter has become my second-generation customer.

Adrish Mukharjee, Partner, Tirupati Jewellers, Ranchi

The over-reactive consumer

On the occasion of Bengali New Year, we introduced new software in the billing system but it had minor glitches that led to issues in bringing out computer-generated bills. A couple walked in, the man being an ex-army personnel, demanding the weight machine to show up to three decimal points. We informed him of the glitch and suggested taking a manual bill for the desired measurement precision, but he got angry. I asked the software professional to fix the glitch at any cost. Finally, the software got fixed and the billing was done smoothly.

Samar De, Partner, Guinea Emporium, Kolkata