Customer Service in Child Care

Just like with retaining employees, it is much easier and more cost-effective to retain your current customers than to have to seek new ones.  And, similarly, word-of-mouth is the best way to gain (or lose) customers.  

Obviously, we need to provide high-quality child care.  But, other than taking excellent care of their children, what else can we do to make parents happy? 

• We must have an established Customer Relations Policy and make sure that each of our staff members is trained in it prior to service and periodically throughout their tenure with us.
• We must provide service as quickly and effectively as possible, providing friendly, equal treatment to all patrons. 
• We must demonstrate solid listening skills and be adept at both verbal and nonverbal communication.
• We must use appropriate courtesy regardless of whether the parent is on the phone or standing in front of us.
• We must focus on solutions rather than problems and attempt to identify win-win situations.
• We must retain full control of our own emotions and know when we need to refer a difficult situation to a supervisor or another individual.

Next week we’ll talk about how to assess parent satisfaction with our program.

Misty