Retail Observer

RETAILOBSERVER.COM MAY 2024 32 A critical part of an effective business plan is always an emphasis on quality. The key policy and procedure areas that you've outlined in your CSC Application reflect your emphasis on quality and should be clearly stated and constantly updated to reflect the state of your business and the current conditions in your marketplace. Quality represents a key goal that should be communicated to and understood by both your employees and customers at all times. All of the criteria used in evaluating every CSC are not currently reviewed every time you renew your CSC Certification, based on the assumption that you are updating these documents as necessary. The goal is always to emphasize quality with the understanding that the individual steps to get to your quality goals will obviously change over time. In order to review each CSC applicant accurately, it is necessary to have you share these ongoing changes or updates with the Certified Service Center during each future renewal. As we review renewal applications that are submitted, we see that in many cases the categories such as Customer Service and Company Repair Warranty have remained the same for long periods of time. What is important is not what a CSC reviewer sees at renewal time, it's what your employees understand about your current policies and procedures. For example, if you've expanded your operations, the procedures within your Customer Service policy should have changed. If your policies and procedures have been updated to reflect a needed change and communicated to your employees and customers, then everyone should be operating in conjunction with that policy. If not, then your current policies can't possibly be followed. Your current company goals in different key areas should also be known to everyone in your company, along with your progress toward achieving those goals. This is especially true in areas like response time and customer problem resolution. These goals should be spelled out along with periodic progress reports on how the company is doing in meeting or hopefully exceeding the stated goals. This provides an opportunity to receive important feedback on the goals to see if they are fair and realistic, along with opening the door for ongoing suggestions on how to improve performance even further in the future. Another key area is to modify your standard warranty policy to reflect changes that should be updated as needed, and make sure it is posted for employees and customers to see. This should always specifically reflect your current general warranty and also any special sales and service situations that might impact your customers. Keeping your policies and procedures current is important and must be communicated to your personnel and customers. Don't be the company with posted internal policy memos still on the bulletin board from 2018. If you keep everyone updated as necessary and communicate any changes regularly to everyone, it will help ensure compliance and understanding. In the future, it's to be hoped that you'll also communicate these updates to CSC to help us properly recertify your company by reviewing these changes to key policies, and also to give us a chance to look for current trends and changes in specific industries. YOUR BUSINESS PLAN: QUALITY IS KEY S E R V I C E D E P A R T M E N T Don Pierson, Certified Service Center (CSC) www.certifiedservicecenter.org RO

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