A survey conducted in a customer service centre found that customers who had made multiple previous calls to resolve an issue were highly likely to give a low rating to the quality of the last call even if that operator resolved the problem. They do this to express the frustration of the previous unsuccessful attempts. This is referred to as “baggage”.

To address this problem, they conducted two parallel experiments. One where the operator ignores the history of calls made. And the other where the operator acknowledges the fact and gives the customer an opportunity to tell what they had tried already. They referred to this approach as “baggage handling”. The results were striking. The customer was found to be 86% more likely to rate the service quality higher in the second scenario.

In both cases, the operator resolved the problem faced by the customer, so the operation-related service was of the same standard. But simply acknowledging the frustration and listening to him/her significantly reduced the negative feelings he/she had associated with the company’s service so far.

It is a lesson that applies in all spheres of life. Acknowledge each other’s pain/frustration. It always works better than ignoring.