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Education

me was that my merchants were invested in my company happens. This is how you prove that your customer service
on a more personal level than they otherwise would be if is better. If you really want to bring home your claim, tell
they knew my company's name, but not the individuals the prospect to then call his or her current processor's 800
representing the brand. This is how you stem attrition. number and compare it to yours. It is almost certain you
And when you lose a merchant to a competitor, odds are will beat them hands down ‒ provided you use the model
that when the merchant calls customer service and the described above.
quality of service isn't even close to what you provided,
the merchant will come back. At the end of the day, what is customer service? It's neither
customer nor service. It's the opportunity to provide
Second is that in-house staff can perform a low-key upsell merchants with better relationships and to build on those
or, as they say in the restaurant business, "suggestive relationships.
selling." There is no way that calling an anonymous 800 Give that a shot, and let me know what happens.
number is ever going to be as good as you and your team
are. So what you need to do is hire and train people who Steve Norell is director of sales at US Merchant Services Inc. Based in Port
understand and adopt your customer service philosophy.
St. Lucie, Fla., he oversees the USMS sales force and maintains the com-
Provide proof pany's bank and processor relationships. You can reach him by email at
steven@usmsllc.com or by phone at 772-220-7515.
Many years ago, I shared a booth at a tradeshow
with another MLS who was representing a different
company. A potential merchant customer stopped
and asked him why he should process with his SnapShot of Up Coming Events
company. The MLS responded with the usual
comment in those days, which was, "We have a
better level of customer service."

With that, the merchant asked a question that left
the MLS dumbfounded. The merchant said, "Prove
it." The MLS finally responded by stating there was
no way he could prove it until the prospect became
one of his customers. The merchant came back and
said, "I am not going to just take your word for it,
and I am not going to sign with you on a leap of April 8-10, 2019
faith." Hilton Washington DC National Mall

Well, it went downhill from there, and the merchant Washington, D.C.
moved on. I got to thinking about this and realized https://www.americanbanker.com/conference
the merchant was right. If my company was ever /power-of-prepaid-2019
going to be the type of business that made sales on
more than just the usual "I can save you money" line,
we had to do it with better customer service and be
able to prove it when asked.

So this is what we did. I set up the 800 number to
ask just one question when a merchant calls. Based
on that, the caller hits one number, and someone on
staff answers the phone. No call waiting, no music,
no ads. If the first line is busy, the system hunts to
a second phone, and if that is busy, then it tries the
next one until someone answers. Sometimes I have
answered when everyone else is busy. I don't always
have the answer, but I get to have a conversation
with the merchant and say I will get the answer and April 30 - May 2, 2019
call right back. Mandalay Bay
Las Vegas, NV
Whenever one of our MLSs is at a merchant trying https://www.electran.org/events/etatransact/
to seal the deal, all the rep has to do is have the
merchant call our 800 number and see what

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