Is self-service the future?

According to a survey carried out by Deloitte, four out of five Brits own a smartphone, and one in three check it even in the middle of the night. If the United Kingdom has never been so dependent on smartphones as it is today, Italy and the rest of the world are not far behind it.
The methods and times for getting information, buying and seeking assistance are changing. While, at the same time, users' expectations, as far as service is concerned, are on the increase, with requests for active customer care 24/7. The answer? Self-service.

THE ADVANTAGES OF SELF-SERVICE

Everyone is kept happy when they have everything instantly and this is also the case when seeking solutions to our problems. The advantages of self-service for the consumer are clear, but what are the advantages for the company? 
- Increased revenue - Practicality brings rewards and many customers are willing to pay for the practicality of a service. Moreover, self-service reduces the number of disappointed customers, increasing loyalty, repeat orders and long term earnings.
- Reduced customer care costs - Customers who use the on-line system to solve problems themselves cost the company less: customer satisfaction increases, while operational costs drop.
- More efficient use of resources - Self-service contributes to making the customer care workload more efficient. Offering customers the option of serving themselves, reduces the need to provide individual care for simple operations. This way, sales and customer care assistants can focus on more complex, important requests for customer care, developing new up-selling opportunities

CUSTOM4U: CUSTOM'S SELF-SERVICE CUSTOMER CARE

Among the latest offers from CUSTOM, there is also the new portal capable of offering a 360° view of everything linked to the after-sales service, simultaneously offering a customised service for each Customer.
- The CUSTOM4U support portal
CUSTOM4U is a portal developed to better serve partners, distributors and customers and with greater continuity, providing all the necessary resources to those who have purchased and use CUSTOM products.
In just one month since going on line, it has been visited by more than 4,300 users in 101 different countries, recording more than 5,000 downloads.
- Contents
From CUSTOM4U, it is possible to autonomously discover the many materials and resources designed to support professional activity: from free diagnostic software, to drivers, firmware, right up to on line orders for spare parts. 
- Access and safety
The site functions on the basis of the registration of each user, making it safer and more automated. Furthermore, for each customer, a management console of registered users has been prepared that can verify which users are accessing the CUSTOM4U site at any given time.
- Individual customer care
Despite the fact that self-service has changed the role of customer care, the presence of a contact centre remains an important success factor. 
The CUSTOM4U portal offers instant access to the only contact number for customer care and support; the Service Center Custom (SCC). This is a service set up in 2001 and nowadays an important - next business day - service that is highly specialised, capable of guaranteeing an SLA of 8 hours thanks to a devoted staff of 300 specialised technicians.
Every day, 50 telephone lines are dedicated to dealing with questions of a technical nature offering specific consulting and IT support on all the CUSTOM GROUP'S products and software, both for the POS and Retail division as well as for OEM products.

Automatisation, business intelligence and technological implementation are the three assets on which the Custom Service Center rotate, a genuine 360 degree management of the machinery found in the Custom customers' sales outlets: from the opening of new shops, to the decommissioning of machinery (technological refurbishment), going from the periodical check of tax products, right up to the management of EXTRA SERVICE (transfers, change of business name, change of location and closures).

Go to www.custom4u.it: and discover CUSTOM's 360° world of customer care!