The secret to making a customer happy lies in three simple words: 'I am sorry.'
These words have served Mr Lee Joo Chai well in his 15 years as a retail adviser in the food division of Takashimaya Department Store.
Mr Lee, 56, who has a daughter and son in their 20s, won Takashimaya's Star Staff Of The Year in 1997 and has also received numerous letters of compliments from satisfied customers.
He was sent on an all-expenses-paid learning trip to Japan in 1997 to observe the service standards in the Takashimaya store there.
Armed with only a Secondary 4 education in 1993, he joined the company after signing up at a job exhibition. Now, as a senior retail adviser, he claims he still has much to learn.
He recounts an incident in 2006 when he had to deal with a difficult customer.
A Korean customer, who had his shirt stained by a few drops of water in Food Village, Takashimaya's basement food court, kicked up such a fuss that Mr Lee's colleagues called him in to relieve the tension.
But the customer was not appeased even after Mr Lee offered to send him home to change his shirt and have his shirt replaced with a new one.
Mr Lee later realised he had failed to placate the customer because he did not apologise.
'Now, I always say sorry first if anything goes wrong and then, attempt to solve the problem,' he says.
In the end, his efforts were worthwhile as the same customer went back to shop at the store the next day.
'That was my satisfaction,' he adds.
This article was first published in The Straits Times on Jul 20, 2008.
