Published on February 18, 2020
Customer feedback received by Tata Steel Downstream Products (TSDPL) pointed towards a need to revamp its Customer Complaint Management System (CCMS). Accordingly, it identified the customer complaints handling mechanism at Tata Steel as ideal for replication at its end. Through an Excellence Practice Implementation Champion (EPIC) best practice-sharing session on March 22, 2019, TSDPL understood the process and subsequently, planned for its implementation.
To implement the learnings received, TSDPL formed a cross-functional team of people from marketing, business improvement, and operations. The team held focused group discussions to identify opportunities for improvements. Thereafter, each business unit developed an action plan for improvement.
The potential reasons for delays in complaint logging, complaint settlement, and credit note approval policy were revisited, as per the plan, to bring agility in the process. The complaints and the Corrective Action Preventive Action (CAPA) is now checked by an expert before finally closing the complaints. TSDPL is working on updating its complaint management workflow to include a shorter, longer, and an express loop to resolve complaints. It is also planning to develop an application that will enable its customers to log their complaints, track their status and provide feedback.
The EPIC session, facilitated by Tata Business Excellence Group (TBExG), laid the foundation for the successful revamp of TSDPL’s customer handling process. Through the knowledge-sharing sessions, TSDPL understood Tata Steel’s complaint handling process in the B2B, B2C, and the B2ECA (emerging corporate accounts) spaces. The following concepts were elaborated during the session:
- Introduction of short loop
- Defining service-level agreements
- Strengthening of daily management
- Process re-engineering
- Procedure to log complaints
- Monitoring and providing feedback using an app
The sessions have helped TSDPL refine its customer complaint handling process. The enhanced process has resulted in improved customer satisfaction index, experience index, and complaint handling scores.
| Parameters | FY’18 | FY’19 |
| Customer Satisfaction Index | 82 | 84 |
| Experience Index | 77 | 85 |
| Complaint Resolution Time (Days) | 8 | 7 |
| No. of Repeat Complaints | 135 | 128 |
About the EPIC Programme
EPIC (Excellence Practice Implementation Champion) carries forward the Tata Best Practices Programme by helping companies adopt best practices from the group through a structured collaborative process, under the guidance of Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) from Best Practice organisations. EPIC is a platform that brings together the provider and the receiver companies together to enable successful adaptation and implementation of best practices.