Why the constant followup, Mr. Mahindra ??

We have been members of Club Mahindra since 2006. In fact in 2006, the Club Mahindra Delhi office didn’t collect all our EMIs and I followed up with them to pay. The last EMI was collected in 2008 after I wrote an email to Mr. Anand Mahindra !!

The above information is to provide context for the series of pictures pasted below … these are screen shots of the SMS reminders that I have been getting from Club Mahindra to remind me about the ASF payment. Our due date is May 31st and since May 1st, I have started getting these reminders three times a day and a couple of phone calls every other day. I am a very irritated customer. I picked up one of the first calls and the representative told me that I can pay the ASF that day to avail a Rs. 500 discount. I told him the due date was May 31st, and that I have already received reminders on SMS and email about it. His next question, was plain suicidal with a customer like me – “will you pay before May 31st?” … luckily I was in a good mood and I replied with a “hopefully”. Before that question he tried debating about the due date, saying it was May 30th. I again let him off, by saying please check the emails and SMS sent by your team – they say May 31st.

Now, some customer service lessons to Club Mahindra –

1. Using payment history – Customer payment history is with you and you need to use it. Nothing irritates a customer more than receiving reminders about payments when they always pay in time. If for some reason, you don’t receive the payment on the due date, call and appreciate them for paying promptly every month/year and enquire about why the payment hasn’t been made this year. I forgot to pay the AMEX card once – I paid it after two weeks. I called them up to request that the interest charged be waived off. It was done without any hesitation by the customer service rep who picked up the phone. She didn’t have to consult her senior, she didn’t have to ask for permission. I told her truthfully that I had forgotten to pay and she looked up my payment history, appreciated my prompt payments and just reversed the charges instantly. That’s why I will be a forever customer of AMEX.
2. Call Prep – The customer service rep who calls needs to have complete information about the customer – wrong due dates and not knowing the payment history speaks poorly of the training. Debates with customers are fine, so long as you have correct facts. Always remember that the customer pays your salary, not the company ! 
3. Reminders – constant reminders and followup is harassment for promptly paying customers. Hand over the chronic late payers to the collection teams. They can be followed up with because they are being difficult. Why subject every customer to the same treatment when they are not behaving the same way. One size doesn’t fit all.

My question to Mr. Anand Mahindra – you are a business icon and we all look up to you as a patriot and a great values-driven leader besides being a great businessman. Why are your teams following up for the ASF payments this year, given the Covid19 crisis ?? Your members can’t take any holiday for the next three to six months and some of them may want to defer paying the ASF. What would have been great is, if you offered a instalment plan without interest for those who had difficulty in paying the lumpsum ASF and extended the due date by a couple of months or a quarter due to this virus exigency. That would have been the sign of a great organization. The least that can be done, is to ask your teams to stop sending these daily reminders to customers who pay promptly – one before breakfast, one before lunch and one before dinner !!! You had answered to my email in 2007 saying you were equally committed to Club Mahindra even though it was a small portion of your business portfolio, and I was very impressed with the fact that you even bothered to answer me. That customer focus of yours needs to be inculcated in your Club Mahindra teams. Am no one to advise you, but hopefully you will take my question seriously and get your teams off my back. Just to assure you, I will pay my ASF before the due date.