The research from Which? suggests multiple energy firms are falling short of the service customers expect.
Whilst cost increases result from external circumstances, energy remains a vital commodity and firms have a responsibility to help customers feel assured that they can access the right support.
The data suggests many respondents were unhappy with the accuracy of energy payments, complaint handling, and overall customer service quality.
As energy bills remain high for most households, accurate billing and quick responses are vital. Some customers may understandably be worried, or even angry, about the cost of energy bills. To enable as many customers as possible to raise enquiries, energy firms should offer a wide range of customer service channels, from telephony to social media and webchat.
For particularly sensitive or challenging conversations, customers often prefer to speak to a real person and opt for a phone call. In this type of situation, customer service agents’ tone of voice is more important than ever.
Sadly, poor customer experience is often due to cuts in the number of customer service posts. Creating more capacity or outsourcing additional inbound customer servicethat scales up and down to meet changing demand can help. Training is also critical.
Agents should be trained to pick up on cues that could identify if a customer is particularly vulnerable, so they can escalate the enquiry more quickly if required. Some of the more sophisticated AI communication tools can assist advisors in achieving these things.
They can pick up on the tone of customer enquiries across digital communications, supporting customer service teams to understand where further dedicated support may be needed.
