Skills of customer care to improve quality of service

Session 8:

Demonstrate skills of customer care to improve quality of service

Learning Objectives

• Describe the determinants of service quality
• Identify characteristics of good customer care
• Explain the role of customer care in health service delivery

Identify the practices needed to provide excellent customer service Explain the significance of service quality assurance in the development of health service sector.

Describe the Steps for creating an effective customer service program

Define the following terms

• Customer/client
• Care
• Customer care

Customer satisfaction

CUSTOMER

Is someone who receives one or more organization’s (health facility) services or products who has a direct relationship with, or is directly affected by organization.

CARE

Care: is any activity, work performed by health provider to meet needs and problems of a client

CUSTOMER CARE

Is the act of meeting clients needs and problems by providing or delivering professional, helpful, high quality service and assistance

Customer satisfaction

Customer satisfaction measures how well the expectations of a customer concerning a product or service provided by your company have been met.

Customer satisfaction is an abstract concept and involves such factors as the quality of the product, the quality of the service provided, the atmosphere of the location where the product or service is purchased, and the price of the product or service.

Factors for customer satisfaction

• quality, performance and efficiency of the product.
• Customer service provided by the healthcare
• Type and quality of response provided by the healthcare.
• Environment – Infrastructure (structure and facilities)

Price of the product or services provided

Characteristics of good customer services

Politeness: Politeness is almost a lost art. Saying 'hello,‘ “welcome” 'good afternoon,' 'sir', and 'thank you very much' are a part of good customer service Responsiveness: Respond promptly to the needs of patients, customers and fellow team members.

• Problem solving: Be proactive in anticipating and preventing problem before they arise

Respect: Treat patients and team members as you would want to be treated Professionalism: All customers/patients should be treated professionally, which means the use of competence or skill expected of the professional.

Listening & Being Compassionate

• Teamwork:
• Confidential
• Accountability
• Promptness

Characteristics of good customer services cont..

Key element of customer care

Understanding: Understand, identify, and anticipate needs. Customers don’t really buy products or services; they buy solutions to problems. The better we solve those problems, the more appreciative they are, and the better their experiences in dealing with your business.

Listening: Keep your ears—and eyes—open. Hear what the market is saying, and be a good listener. Identify customer needs by asking questions and concentrating on what the customer is really saying.

Responding: Now you have to respond positively. This is not to say that you have to change your entire business model or product line to suit the demands of various customers. Seek ways to help your customers and give them what they are looking for without compromising your company or products.

Key element of customer care cont..

Respect: Respect the fact that customers actually pay our salaries and make our profits for us. Make them feel important and appreciated and treat them as individuals Serving: Essentially this means fulfilling your promises.

Trust : Give great customer service, you’re going to have to put a little trust in your customers.

Basic needs of Patient/customer

Basic needs of Client/customer

Friendliness

The most basic need of all and is usually associated with being greeted politely and courteously.

• Fairness
• All customers want to be treated fairly.

Control

Control represents the customer’s need to feel as if they have an impact on the way things turn out.

• Options and Alternatives

Provide the customer with other available avenues to get what they want accomplished.

Basic needs of Client/customer cont..

Understanding and Empathy

Customers need to feel that their circumstances and feelings are appreciated and understood by the service person without criticism or judgment.

Information

Customers need and want to be informed about products, policies and procedures they encounter when doing business with you.

Principles of customer care

Reliable: Being honest and trustworthy in all interactions with customers and meeting commitments Relationships: Valuing the role of every family, child, and staff member and working together as a team to achieve positive outcomes

Principles of customer care cont..

Responsive: Reacting in a timely manner to meet responsibilities to address identified needs.

Respectful: Interacting with customers in a way that makes them feel valued and promotes dignity and self-worth.

Recognition: Showing appreciation for the contributions of each team member openly and frequently

Techniques used in providing quality customer care

Engage in active listening

Active listening is essential for effective communication. It allows for a better understanding of the customers’ needs and shows a willingness to help. Allow the customer to talk without interruption, reflect back their main question or concern and ask clarifying questions when necessary.

Highlight understanding

Ensure that each customer is aware that you understood their needs. By using active listening techniques and asking relevant questions, you will communicate that you understand them and are making an effort to help solve their problem.

Techniques used in providing quality customer care

Polite

Be polite and have respect for your customers. Always use “please” and “thank you” and create an inviting environment for the customers.

Call the customer by his/her name

Ask the customer their name and pronounce it correctly. This communicates respect for the customer and lets them know that they are important.

Be proactive

Engage in proactive steps to satisfy the customer’s needs. Being proactive will also help to reduce barriers when problem solving.

Techniques used in providing quality customer care

Highlight pros and cons

When describing a product or service, include both its strengths and weaknesses relative to alternatives. By providing balanced recommendations, customers will view you as more credible. This increases trust and customer satisfaction.

Explain

Customers are not always familiar with your company’s policies or procedures. Thoroughly explain to customers what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. A clear understanding tends to decrease customer frustration.

Techniques used in providing quality customer care

• Use plain language
• Avoid technical terms, jargon and acronyms. Be professional, concise and clear

Summarize conversations

Summarize the main point of the conversation before engaging in the problem solving process. This will demonstrate that you were listening attentively. It will also facilitate a mutual understanding between you and customer.

What is Quality of Care?

When we say quality of care, we mean healthcare activities that we in the medical, nursing, laboratory fields etc. perform daily to benefit our patients without causing harm to them.

Quality of Care demands that we pay attention to the needs of patients and clients.

With Quality of Care we do the right things at the right time. We see to patients promptly, make the right diagnosis and give the right treatment.

Components of Quality Health Services

• Access to Service

Technical Competence

• Equity
• Effectiveness
• Efficiency
• Safety

Interpersonal Relations

Access to Service

Everyone should have access to quality health care. Access refers to the ability of the individual to obtain health services.

Some of the factors that can affect access are:

Distance: e.g. where health facility is sited far away or it is difficult to get transport to the facility access to quality health care becomes a problem.

Financial: e.g. where people cannot pay for the services provided.

Culture, beliefs and values: The services provided may not be in line with the culture, beliefs and values of some people.

Technical Competence

Technical competence as an indicator of quality assurance implies that we should have adequate knowledge and skills to carry out our functions in order to provide quality service. E.g. one must go to a nursing school and pass the nursing examinations before she/he can work as a nurse.

Even though we are no longer in school, we have to continue to update our knowledge by reading health books and attending in-service training workshops etc.

As health professionals, you should also know your limits, that is, know what you can do and what you cannot do. With respect to what we cannot do.

Equity

Quality services should be provided to all people who need them, be they poor, children, adults, old people, pregnant women, disabled etc. Quality services should be available in all parts of the country, in villages, towns and cities.

Effectiveness

You are interested in the type of care that produces positive change in the patient's health or quality of life. We therefore use treatments that are known to be effective.

Efficiency

Efficiency is the provision of high quality care at the lowest possible cost. We are expected to make the best use of resources and avoid waste of our scarce resources.

• We waste resources by :
• proposing unnecessary drugs
• stocking more drugs than is required and making them expire

buying supplies and equipment we do not use

Safety

Safety means that when providing health services. To reduce injuries, infections, harmful side effects and other dangers to clients and to staff.

In providing quality care, you should not put the patient's life at risk. For example, You should not give unsafe blood to patients and thereby infect them with HIV/AIDS.

Interpersonal Relations

It refers to the relationship between us and our clients and communities, between health mangers and their staff.

• You should:
• Show respect to our clients;
• Feel for our patients;
• Not be rude or shout at them;

Not disclose information we get from patients to other people.

What Is Quality Assurance?

Quality Assurance is a set of activities that are planned for, carried out systematically or in an orderly manner and continuously to improve quality of care.

• It involves:

The setting of standards.

Monitoring to see if there is a gap between what is being done now and what is expected; and addressing the gap on a regular basis (quality improvement).

Quality Assurance also requires that health workers understand the needs of patients and their communities in order to provide for them.

Principles of Quality Assurance

• There are five basic principles of quality assurance;-
• Quality Assurance is oriented towards meeting the needs and expectations of our clients
• Quality Assurance focuses on systems and processes
• Quality Assurance uses data to analyze service delivery
• Quality Assurance encourages the use of teams in problem solving and quality improvement

Quality Assurance uses effective communication to improve service delivery

Meeting the Needs of Our Clients – Principle 1

The people we provide health services for are very important to us. Without them, we will not be in employment. Therefore we must do our best to satisfy them.

Focusing On Systems – Principle 2

Systems are the various aspects or components of service delivery that have to operate together as a unit in a facility to deliver quality health care. The three components of service delivery; namely; inputs, processes and outcomes have already been explained above.

Principles of Quality Assurance cont…

Use of Data to Improve Quality – Principle 3

We collect a lot of information (data) in our health facilities but we just send them on to the District Director without making use of them. Some of the data we collect include the number of people who attend the OPD, their age and sex. We also collect information on the number of cases of malaria, diarrhoea, mothers dying from pregnancy, delivery and after delivery.

Data can also be used in identifying resources (people, drugs and supplies as well as the amount of money) required for health services.

• QN;-
• Mention Sources of Data

Principles of Quality Assurance cont…

Tools for Collecting Data and Use of Information

Before you set out to collect data for monitoring the progress of your QA, you need to agree on how you are going to collect the data.

• The common tools used for data collection during monitoring are:
• Checklist
• Observational guide
• Questionnaires

Interview

Improving Quality Through Team Work – Principle 4

A team is a group of people who work together to achieve a common goal. In health service delivery we have different kinds of health workers working together.

There are labourers to clean the unit, records officers to register the patient, nurses to take the temperature and weight, the medical assistants to examine and prescribe the drugs, laboratory technicians to do the investigations and the dispensary technicians to give the drugs.

• Question
• What are Advantages of teamwork in healthcare

Principles of Quality Assurance cont…

Effective Communication -Principle 5

Communication is a process by which messages are passed from a sender to a receiver with feedback to the sender. In health delivery there is communication between:

• Health worker and Patient;
• Health worker and Community;

Health worker and Health worker.

Evaluation

• Describe the significance of service quality assurance in the health service sector
• Explain the role of customer care in the health services delivery
• What are the customer care principals in provision health services

Identify the practices needed to provide excellent customer service

References

• ChangeSource. (date unknown) Change Management Toolbook. Retrieved September 10,

2009 from http://www.change-management-toolbook.com/mod/book/view.php?id=74

• Hisrich, R.D., Peters, M.P., & Shepherd, D.A. (2005). Entrepreneurship. (6th Ed.) Boston:
• McGraw-Hill.
• Hogher, Thomson. Education. New Delhi: Mc Graw-Hill Publishing Organization.
• Kuratko, D.F., & Hodgetts, R.M. (2007). Entrepreneurship: Theory, Process & Practice.

(7th Ed.) USA: Thomson.