Sometimes, in a high-pressure environment, your customer tends to lose their calm. There could be many reasons behind it ranging from bad customer experience to their internal matters. Nevertheless, angry customers are often seen as the biggest hurdle to cross in maintaining a positive relationship. Better to be always prepared for such situations and never giving upon them.

When you are in a customer-centric business, it is not always possible to keep your customer happy. There are many reasons that can upset them which you might not even know about. Hence, it is worth looking at a few of those reasons so that it doesn’t come to you as a surprise.

Why do customers get angry?

Customer handling can be stressful sometimes. There could be chances that it is not entirely your fault yet you are caught in an argument at the wrong time. Sometimes their frustration has been building up in stages and they finally burst out at you. Other times, there are various factors that are in play. Let’s look at those factors now.

Poor customer service

There could be chances that a customer is getting frustrated from your customer service. They could be waiting for long in their queue to get their queries resolved. The frustration with the issue from your product gets magnified when faced with poor customer support.

Cultural difference

Most of the companies outsource their support function to third party service vendors located in a different country. When customers call them and find it difficult to communicate, there is nothing more frustrating than that. The language barrier plays a major role in turning a customer angry.

Poor workflow

The workflow you have setup in your company could also be one of the reasons for an angry customer. Especially if it doesn’t resolve their queries immediately. You must value your customer’s time. And when they raise a complaint, you must resolve it immediately within a least turnaround time. Lengthy and overcomplicated processes to delegate their issue from one department to another makes them frustrated.

Personal reasons

Finally, there are high chances that it is not your fault yet you become a point of venting out their anger. They might be already stressed with their own issues either in their personal or professional life. And when a small issue arises through your service, it becomes a trigger to vent out their whole anger.

How to deal with an angry customer?

Having seen few of the reasons for them to get angry, let us now look at the ways to deal with them. The above reasons are not the complete list but it gives you a brief idea about what can cause them anger. There can be many more reasons which are specific to your business context. The reasons can be many, the emotions are the same. Nonetheless, there are a few tactics you can apply to deal with a dissatisfied customer.

Remain calm and composed

It is the most vital weapon against an angry customer. If by chance you lose your calm and give into the customer’s outburst then you would totally lose the game. During the conversation, there might be thoughts popping up in your head about how wrong the customer is. Yet, you must refrain from pointing them out immediately.

You must already know what to say to an angry customer and what not. While they are angry, the last thing they would want to hear is someone correcting them. All you need to do is to remain calm and actively listen to all that they have to say. It is all coming from the bad experience they had with your product. And they just need someone to report those issues to.

Show empathy

For the problems they are reporting, you must say that if it were you at their shoes, you would have felt the same frustration. When they are boiling with anger, before you give them a solution, they need someone who can truly empathize with their situation. Through empathy, you must try to cool them down until they reach the point where they are ready to listen.

Find the root cause of the problem

Once you have shown your empathy and won their confidence, try getting into the root of the problem. An angry customer is showing you the symptoms but you have to identify the point where the root problem lies. Only then would you be in a situation to show them how you can fix the problem for them.

Show gratitude

Instead of reacting negatively to an irate customer, you must totally change the ball game by showing them gratitude. Thanking them for bringing this issue to their notice would help them a lot in getting calm. They would not only be felt heard but also realize that your organization is open for constructive criticism.

It would help them feel that they have not lost respect in your eyes by being a mad customer. Instead, they would feel that they are being valid by raising a voice for a genuine cause.

Inform them of your further actions

Listening to the whole issue and closing the conversation by just saying that we will look into it is not enough. An angry guest needs solution. You need to tell your angry customer about what steps you will take to fix the issue.

After you have highlighted the cause of the problem, run them through the steps that you will take to fix it. It would show that you really care about the customer and are ready to take immediate action towards customer satisfaction.

Set up a time to respond

Most of the time the problem they have reported cannot be fixed over a phone call. You need to consult with your technical support team or your manager to bring changes to your product features. Hence, you must set up a time limit within which you would respond to your angry customer.

This time limit would be beneficial for both you and them. It will give your angry client enough time to cool off their anger. While on the other hand, you would get enough time to consult with your technical expert on the problem. In the meantime, you can also speak to your manager about this issue and get their guidance on dealing with rude customers.

Final Take

While being in a customer-centric business, remember that giving the best service to the customer is of paramount importance. But there has to be a limit too that you must set. At any point in the conversation, if the customer crosses the line where they start being abusive or aggressive in their tone, then you don’t need to tolerate that. You must find a proper channel to escalate the issue and the company must take necessary steps toward that.

As long as it is related to work and the customer is keeping it to the issues with your product or service, it must be handled well. These incidents do not happen very often but when it does, make sure to highlight it to your superiors along with the steps you took to resolve the matter. Your ability to perform with the right judgement while being calm and composed would determine your capacity of working in a stressful situation. And that’s a very valuable lesson in your journey towards the evolution of your career.

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