By Diane Palombi, OD
How does your practice handle patient-practice disputes and difficulties? Recent customer service experiences in businesses outside optometry remindme why treating patients with respect was so important to me when I was in practice.
Little retail lies
The first experience involved a large, well known national gift basket company.I talked to four different customer service representatives over a two-week period. All four seemed nice and pleasant, but three of them flat-out lied to me to keep a sale. I was told that the basket had been shipped twice only later to find out that it was on back order.
The third rep promised me a refund since the item wasn’t going to be shipped in time for Christmas. That did not happen either. The item did get shipped early–in January. The fourth customer service representative was apologetic but that was all. This company got their sale, but I won’t be ordering from them again. Catching someone in a lie does not set well with me.
The second episode involved a local pizza chain.I was told that my pizza would be ready for pick up in 30 minutes when I placed my order over the phone. Upon my arrival thirty minutes later I was informed that the order had not been started since they ran out of pepperoni. I had to either pick a substitute topping or wait an additional thirty minutes for pepperoni to be picked up from another location before they could even start my order.I chose to substitute and wait an additional 25 minutes for my order to be done. Why I wasn’t called on the phone about the problem before I left my house to pick up the pizza is puzzling.
They must not have wanted to bother with it and felt it was OK to inconvenience me. I e-mailed their customer service department, but did not get a response. Somehow I was not too surprised.
Where has customer service gone?
Unfortunately, these are not isolated instances. Across the business world, customer service seems to have deteriorated. It is difficult to get a phone call returned despite the fact it should be easier with cell phones and text messaging. Shoddy workmanship or poor service is not unusual either.
When I was still an associate doctor at LensCrafters, I always wanted my patients to have a pleasant experience when they came in for their eye exams. My emphasis on creating a pleasing patient experience was even more important to me when I had my own practice. It is impossible for order snags and snafus not to ever happen, but we took steps to minimize the possibilities of errors. For example, I liked to put in a fudge factor for spectacle and contact lens deliveries. My staff would give patients an estimated arrival date that was at least a few days longer than we thought it would actually take.
Under-promise, over-deliver
In other words, we under-promised and over-delivered. It’s customer service 101: Better to pleasantly surprise patients than disappoint them. If a problem did occur, we always called and informed the patient. If I felt that the patient had been inconvenienced I would give them a gift like lens cleaner or extra contact lens starter kits.
Refunds also were sometimes in order. I always liked the saying, “Sometimes you have to lose the battle to win the war.” No one likes to give a refund, especially if you feel it is not justified. However, if you lose the patient, you may also lose the rest of his family, friends and associates. People tend to talk more about negative experiences than positive ones.
Another important customer service lesson: Don’t lie to your patients. They can learn the truth from unexpected sources. My nephew in Seattle recently contacted me about his contact lenses. His new optometrist wanted to switch him into different contacts. The doctor said the new brand was much better. Since they were more expensive, my nephew wanted my opinion. I was honest and told him that his old lenses were fine. This optometrist wanted to get my nephew into a private label brand so he would be stuck getting replacements from him. Lying to patients ruins your credibility if you get caught. Even with small things, it is much better to admit fault and apologize.
Make life easier for patients
Try to make your patients’ lives easier rather than introducing new problems. I have seen doctors who do not verify insurance benefits before the exam. If the doctor then performs a procedure that is not coverage by the insurance, the patient gets billed for it. The patient ends up being the one who has to fight with the insurance company if the procedure was necessary.
Patients do not like to pay for unexpected expenses for which there is no insurance coverage. My practice made it standard procedure to verify insurance benefits before the patient came in. That way there were no unpleasant surprises. We also went to bat for the patient with the insurance company if we were not paid for a covered procedure. We very rarely had to bill a patient. Patients get frustrated dealing with insurance companies. They appreciate it when you handle the problem.
Another good rule of thumb is to treat patients the way you would want to be treated. I never liked waiting long for my own doctor appointments. Therefore, running on schedule was very important to me. That meant not overbooking myself. If circumstances led me to fall behind schedule, I was extremely apologetic to my patient. The patient was also informed upon their arrival of the estimated wait time before their exam.
That way they had the option of rescheduling if the wait time was too long for them. I prided myself that I usually ran on time. If I was running behind schedule, it was usually due to a late patient. If patients were extremely late we would require that they reschedule if we had no way of squeezing them in without inconveniencing others.
Finally, keep in mind that a well prepared office is more capable than an unprepared office of satisfying patients. It is important to always be prepared for your patient’s arrival. My office would pull the patient’s file the day before their appointment. I learned this when I worked at Lenscrafters, where the occasional missing file could delay things considerably until it was hopefully located.
Electronic health records have probably alleviated this issue, but the same can be said for insurance forms, authorizations from vision plans, contact lens trays and spectacle trays. You do not look organized and efficient when searching for misplaced items in your office.
We like our patients. We would like to keep our patients. We would like our patients to refer more patients to us. In order for that to happen we need to keep our patients happy. Nothing does that better than good customer service.
How does your practice under-promise and over-deliver? How do you ensure patients are always treated well and with respect?
Diane Palombi, OD, is the now-retired former owner of Palombi Vision Center in Wentzville, Mo. To contact her: dlpod1@hotmail.com
