When anything less than excellent costs money
What to do? Most commercial transactions are straightforward. You pay your money and you take (your chances). The buyer and the seller are part (and parcel) in the equation, but guilt isn’t one of the variables. And then there’s the commission sales agent.
Remember, back in school, where you were graded on some particular action? Even the most ingratiating kid wasn’t apt to beg for extra marks. That virtue disappears when the remuneration depends on customer satisfaction (and yes, I’m not forgetting tips after a meal). We picked up our new car this evening, with the signing of the documents and the transfer of the keys and the talk. Not the sales talk, because we’re already customers. The talk about the importance of completing the customer satisfaction survey with the right results.
In a business where a great deal of money changes hands, the “man in the middle” has to prove to his employer that good results are so much more than their own reward. We were told, without equivocation, that the pay slip depends on a certain feedback form used by the manufacturer. Anything less than “Excellent” means a trip to the sales director’s office and substantially less bonus. More information than I, as the customer, needs to know.
Perhaps the manufacturer needs to accept that I rarely rave my praise. Docking commission because I happen to believe in the Bell curve when distributing feedback is petty and unfair to a sales person who has done an acceptable job. Is anyone fooled by a steady return of perfect results (in a field that doesn’t involve compulsory figures and triple jumps)?
