posted 01 June 2001 01:53 PM               

A day in the life of....
energy

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Editors Note: Changed "9004-2000 Section 8.2.2.1" to read "9004-2000 Section 8.2.1.2"

posted 03 June 2001 08:29 PM               

I think you're reading it right. If you send out a survey you're being active. If you rely on, or include, unsolicited letters from customers and such it's passive.

-> Passive looks too easy. Like, " I don't have that information because I never got it."

First ö can you define what, in your company, you consider passive?

I would say most companies have some form of active aspect. I see both as important parts. If I went into a company and they said they had no passive customer feedback I would really begin to seriously wonder. No letters of appreciate? No letters from dissatisfied customers at all? No calls from dissatisfied customers? Never? Ever?

You will never convince me that there is a company out there that does not receive some form of passive feedback. It just happens! Like magic! I bet Ford gets a lot of unsolicited calls about their Explorers...

That said -- I had a client which was quite small ö 12 employees. They explained they had not had a customer complaint for over 8 years. No letters. No phone calls. Nothing. But when we talked they better understood what a complaint is ö to them ö in their company. One aspect is that a sales rep visits every customer every month for at least a day to monitor the process and help in any way possible. The visits are, not that I agree, not documented (I think theyâll have to do that for the 2000 version Îupgradeâ). The problem for them initially was defining exactly what a customer complaint is. They restricted customer complaints (their definition) to a phone call, a FAX or other communication (of dissatisfaction or nonconformance) not originating in the customer facility with a rep. And by that definition they had not had a complaint in over 8 years. For a more complete understanding, the product is metal cleaning chemicals and phosphatizers. Not complex.

Another aspect of the problem is identifying measurables within either type (passive or active) of information gathered. Let's say you do a survey. First of all you won't get all of them back. next is the subjectivity of the questions you ask. This said, I think the most problematic aspect for you will be addressing issues of metrics. It says "Measuring and monitoring of..." and the measuring and associated aspects will be the 'hard' part.

Just some thoughts...

posted 04 June 2001 08:22 AM               

Thanks for the input. I just thought that with the new emphasis on Customer Communication and satisfaction, the authors of the standard would want, if not insist, that a company actively pursue feedback and complaints. To allow you to sit back and wait for some happy or unhappy customer to contact you, (passive) appears to fly in the face the intent of this new requirement. It just looked like a loophole. Like, maybe a comment is made about not doing enough in the Customer Contact area. You can say " I'm passive". I also agree that the measurement and monitoring is going to be a bear. There will be many areas where this will be happening, but it will require a lot of thought bringing it all together for presenting it neatly to an Auditor.

A day in the life·.

energy