The Customer Service Mission

Abstract

Many of today’s customer service departments had their origins as mainly clerical functions at a time when customer service as we know it today was handled by field sales personnel. As this practice became increasingly uneconomic, more and more customer service responsibilities were brought inside and tacked on to the ongoing clerical activities. And thus was born the customer service department. There are still some companies that do not have recognized customer service departments, and others where the customer service function as such is less than five years old. And many of those that do exist reflect their haphazard growth in poor status in the company, inefficient operations and impaired effectiveness in achieving their mission.