Tips, Tricks for the everyday Forwarder
Posts tagged shipping
Is it worthy to help your customers?
0621 days
by admin
in Everything Else
Do you think helping out your customers will benefit you?
I guess some will say yes, others will say no.
Recently, I tried to assist a customer by helping to clear their summons by agreeing to pay half of their summons. For customer retention sake, I am willing to fork out my own money.
Apparently that didn’t go as planned. The customer did not wish to utilize our services further, due to other cheaper forwarders. Apparently, I forgot the most important rule of all businesses: DON’T TRUST YOUR CUSTOMERS.
[More to come]
How do you go through these kinds of situations? Please, leave a comment! Appreciate your insight and feedback..
Delivery Order
0621 days
by admin
in Everything Else
Today we talk about Delivery Order (or delivery note).
What’s a DO or delivery order for? Adding to the overly crowded list of documents required for shipping, a DO is sometimes regarded as a nuisance to some. Adding more paperwork to the abundant dead trees in your office, a DO is actually rather important.
What’s a DO for? (did I repeat this twice?) A DO is a document that ensures the items are being delivered in the same quality and quantity as you would purchase the items right from the store. Simply said, a DO confirms that you receive the right amount of things you send/receive.
How does it work? First off, a DO is usually written by the supplier or sender. He or she double checks the number of items being delivered, then takes down the items and the quantity on a piece of paper. That’s your DO. Frankly, it’s actually the exact same as a Packing List (or packing slip). So a DO and a PL are essentially the same, just for different purposes. Packing lists usually apply for ‘packing’ (house moving for example), whilst a delivery order is usually used for ‘delivery’ (supplier sending to buyer).
Why it’s important: If you are supposed to receive 1000 iPhone 4s, and you only receive 998, you know there’s something wrong with the delivery when you check your delivery order and you count the quantity. Now you don’t want 2 iPhone 4s to be missing do you? (please send one to me)
Iphone 4
Note that in some countries, the terms are used interchangeably. Don’t take the name too seriously.
Bad Customers
0621 days
by admin
in Everything Else
There are many customers, some short, some tall, some fat, some skinny. But most importantly, there are 2 very important types of customers: Good customers and Bad customers.
Question is, how to deal with them?
How I do it: Be nice, be honest, and always remember; he’s your customer.
Take a customer I had a long time ago. He was agitated because I requested for numerous information repeatedly. When I start to source for a suitable carrier through my shippers network for a suitable candidate that could help my customer deliver his goods, the carrier requested for many information just to make sure the tariffs and the duties are declared properly. That’s a good thing I reckon, because you don’t want to get taxed unnecessarily due to wrong declarations.. Well, the customer was agitated because he couldn’t understand why I need so much info, when all the other carriers that he had used (and all the many years experience that he had), he never had to encounter such issues. During that period, I was rather inexperienced, and keep passing the information back and forth. Carrier asks questions, I ask customer, customer returns with some info, I return to carrier, carrier asks for more info…. and so on and so forth. You get the idea. This action probably bugs the customer off, as it might have shown that I do not have that much shipping knowledge as I should if I am helping him to deliver his cargo.
After all the arrangements, the day arrived. It’s time to pick up the goods. The goods was picked; at a very late timing. The customer wanted to pick it up in the afternoon, and the truck arrived in the evening. Constant pressure from the customer was a really bad experience, so to speak. I had to keep explaining why it took so long, and the carrier I used could not answer me well. (had to pick other goods along the way, no trucks available, traffic jams, etc). This is probably my fault, the carrier isn’t a very good carrier after all. Poor service, affordable rate. You get what you pay for.
Bad Customers
End of story, I tried to settle it on my own, clarifying with the carrier as much as posssible before I connected to the customer, and asking questions I think should be asked before I return to the customer. For future customers after that incident, it seems better, as I now provide more detailed information than what they could have gotten if they tried to dig it on their own.
Conclusion:
-Always be prepared for any questions from carriers and customers – this can be gained from experience;
-Research well before choosing a specific carrier – because your reputation is only as strong as the weakest carrier;
-Make sure you try every possible beneficial options for the customer. Make the customer happy is the priority. Carrier happiness actually ranks in second. Don’t get me wrong but, your customer is the one paying you, not the carriers. You actually pay the carriers.
-Greet, befriend your customer, and always remember their name.
-Don’t ever lose your cool. Let the customer rant the hell out of his/her soul. He probably had a bad day himself.
-Be quick-witted. Being quick and create solutions out of problems will ensure that customers will rely on your skills to help them with their issues at hand. Reliance is the key.
