Top 5 Key Benefits of a Complaint Management System

The Complaint Management Software Market: Global Industry Trends, Share, Size, Growth, Opportunity and Forecast 2022-2027 report projects that the global complaint management software market will achieve a value of US$ 3.99 Billion by 2027, up from its 2021 valuation of US$ 1.98 Billion.

Fuelling this growth is the fact that organisations are becoming increasingly aware of the numerous benefits offered by a cloud-based complaint management solution. In this article, we’ll be looking at the advantages that cloud-based and in-house complaint management software bring to the table. We will also discuss how to track customer complaints, using complaints management software and frameworks. 

 

What is complaint management software?

The rise of the well-informed and technologically proficient digital consumer fuels a pressing need for organisations and brands to provide superior customer experiences, and greater customer satisfaction. Research from Microsoft reveals that 90% of Americans use customer service as a factor in deciding whether or not to do business with a company. Salesforce Research backs this up, suggesting that 89% of consumers are more likely to make another purchase after a positive customer service experience.

The onus is therefore on brands and institutions to make issues like customer service and technical support a priority – and this includes the fielding of customer complaints.

Complaint management software is a technology platform used for handling, monitoring, reporting on, and responding to customer grievances and requests in a timely fashion. A cloud-based software or desk solution for complaint management may employ features like an online ticketing system, self-service portals, or tracking software for case management, to help organisations accept, categorise, and track customer complaints from submission to resolution.

Complaint management software typically employs various criteria to give priority to certain customer complaints based on their severity and uses a notification system to alert support agents when issues arise, and to promote customer delight by letting complainants know when their issue has been resolved.

Some of the best complaint management software packages in the off the shelf market include Jira Service Management, Invgate Service Desk, Jira Service Desk, WowDesk, and Zoho Desk.

Key features of complaint management software

A comprehensive complaint management software solution will have features that enable you to:

Collect support tickets from multiple channels, and store them in a single location: These channels may include customer feedback, user feedback (from software and services), data received from mobile apps, a customer portal, etc.

A ticket management system for support agents: Complaint handling software may include interfaces for managing email, social media responses, and support requests submitted via live chat, web forms, or telephony. 

Tools for workflow and employee relations management: Complaints management software may provide automated complaint processing features such as automatic ticket management based on various distribution models. For example, Round Robin distribution allots tickets evenly to all support agents based on certain limits.

 Tools for collaboration: Complaints management software may include a platform for team collaboration, enabling support agents to coordinate their efforts when dealing with specific issues.

Automation tools for complaint handling: A complaint management software solution may provide options for automated complaint handling. These might include for example a self-service portal for common customer grievances, and automatic email task notifications for support agents.

Monitoring and reporting tools: With monitoring dashboards and detailed reports, support managers can improve customer service and ensure a timely response to consumer complaints. With integrated quality management software, managers can measure average response and resolution times for each agent, and take the necessary steps to improve performance and employee relations,

What Is a complaint management framework?

A complaint management framework is a structure and set of guidelines to advise an organisation on the best ways to manage complaints and ensure the consistent delivery of high-quality responses to customer complaints that fall in line with all relevant regulatory compliance demands.

The Australian government’s Department of Education offers a customer complaints management framework template that organisations in all sectors can adapt to apply to their own particular requirements. Key points to consider include:

• What is a customer complaint?
• What is not a customer complaint?
• Accessibility (Listing the channels available for customers to lodge complaints)
• Complaint type and response times
• How we handle customer complaints
• Complaint categories
• Excluded complaints (Issues not covered by your complaint management support team)
• Complainant responsibilities (What the customer is expected to do)

 

Key benefits of a complaints management system

A complaints management system can provide several benefits to your organisation, including:

1. Increasing complaint handling efficiency and customer satisfaction

A secure cloud-based or in-house complaint management solution with centralised data management empowers your organisation to resolve customer complaints in a timely and efficient manner. Good support software provides comprehensive control over your handling of customer queries, and the deployment of your support agents. This ultimately works to increase customer satisfaction — retaining loyal customers and giving a pleasing customer experience to new ones.

2. Ensuring required levels of safety

For highly regulated industries such as health care, chemicals, and consumer goods, customer complaints may indicate serious safety and regulatory compliance issues. Complaint management software can help optimise the complaint handling process and empower organisations to develop a safety management system to efficiently resolve customer complaints, while staying in line with industry guidelines and regulatory compliance obligations.

3. Fielding customer complaints while remaining compliant

Used in conjunction with a complaint management framework, an IT service management solution for dealing with customer complaints provides a powerful tool for your organisation to effectively manage clients’ issues, concerns and complaints, and increase customer satisfaction. By keeping complaint management in tune with all relevant regulatory compliance demands, a comprehensive complaint management solution also helps your organisation to mitigate risks.

4. Giving insights into your own customer service team

A complaint management solution with advanced reporting functionalities can give support managers insight into the performance of their support agents, which assists in quality control, workflow guidance, and other areas needed to optimise the performance of the customer service team.

5. Providing further opportunities to improve

Customer complaints and customer feedback can provide valuable information that empowers you to improve the quality and delivery of your products and services. With a robust complaint management software solution, you can determine the root cause of customer complaints and deploy high velocity teams that implement effective corrective actions and prevent the recurrence of issues that generate further customer complaints.

Summing Up…

As we have seen, having an effective complaint management solution confers multiple benefits on the enterprise. Complaint management software comes in various flavours, including cloud-based systems, and in-house installations that may be purchased off the shelf, or specifically designed in conjunction with a proficient technology provider and partner.

Claromentis is an easy-to-use, integrated and highly customisable platform that sits at the heart of your digital workplace, giving your employees an interactive space for communication, collaborative learning, task management, and knowledge sharing. Our business platform is HIPAA, ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 27001 compliant, helping you meet industry regulations and data privacy law requirements within your organisation.

For your complaint management applications, we can easily build intelligent workflows and customisable online forms to improve accuracy and save time from repetitive tasks. And Claromentis can support your employees by connecting them to the latest information available including documents, files and targeted content to boost real-time collaboration.

To find out more about how you can benefit from a complaint management software solution designed by Claromentis, book a personalised demo.