4.3 Replying to letters of complaint
Acknowledge that you have received the complaint, and thank your customer for informing you.
Thank you for your letter of 6 August informing us that…
We would like to thank you for informing us of our accounting error in your letter of the 7 June.
We are replying to your letter of 10 March in which you told us that…
Sometimes you cannot deal with a complaint immediately, as the matter needs to be looked into. Do not leave your customer waiting, but tell him what you are doing straight away.
While we cannot give you an explanation at present, we can promise you that we are looking into the matter and will write to you again shortly.
As we are sending out orders promptly, I think these delays may have something to do with the haulage contractors and I am making investigations at the moment.
Would you please return samples of the items you are dissatisfied with, and I will send them to our factory in Düsseldorf for tests.
If the complaint is justified, explain how the mistake occurred but do not blame your staff; you employed them, so you are responsible for their actions.
The mistake was due to a fault in one of our machines, which has now been corrected.
There appears to have been some confusion in our addressing system, but this has been adjusted.
Having acknowledged your responsibility and explained what went wrong, you must, of course, put matters right as soon as possible and tell your customer that you are doing so.
We have now checked our accounts and find that we have indeed been sending you the wrong statement due to a confusion in names and addresses. The computer has been reprogrammed and there should be no more difficulties. Please contact us again if any similar situation arises, and once more thank you for pointing out the error.
The reason for the weakness in the units you complained about was due to a faulty manufacturing process in production. This is being corrected at the moment and we are sure you will be completely satisfied with the replacement units we will be sending you in the next few weeks.
If you think the complaint is unjustified, you can be firm but polite in your answer. But even if you deny responsibility, you should always try to give an explanation of the problem.
Our engineer has examined the machine you complained about and in his report tells us that the machine has not been maintained properly, if you look at the instruction booklet on maintenance that we sent you, you will see that it is essential to take care of. . .
Our factory has now inspected the stereo unit you returned last week, and they inform us that it has been used with the wrong speakers and this had overloaded the circuits. We can repair the machine, but you will have to pay for the repairs as misuse of the unit is not included under our guarantee.
It is useful when closing your letter to mention that this mistake, error, or fault is an exception, and it either rarely or never happens, and of course you should apologize for the inconvenience your customer experienced.
In closing we would like to apologize for the inconvenience, and also point out that this type of fault rarely occurs in the Omega 2000.
Finally, may we say that this was an exceptional mistake and is unlikely to occur again. Please accept our apologies for the inconvenience.
The replacements of the faulty articles are on their way to you and you should receive them within the week. We are sure that you will be satisfied with them and there will be no repetition of the faults. Thank you for your patience in this matter, and we look forward to hearing from you again.