Dealing with Client Problems

If you own a business, sooner or later you are going to run into a situation where you screw something up. This situation can be an opportunity or disaster all depending on how you handle it.

To error is human, or so the cliché goes. If you are older than about six months old, you know this is one of those clichés that is utterly and totally true. Some would even define experience as learning from your mistakes. Well, the same thing goes for your business efforts.

You may be the most diligent and hardest working person in the world. This will not insulate you from bonehead moves and mistakes. Sooner or later, you will fail a client or customer. You may not even realize it until they call you. It may be something as simple as forgetting a meeting or something more serious such as missing a deadline. How you handle these situations can kill your business or form long lasting relationships to your benefit.

Everyone makes mistakes. This sounds obvious, but most businesspeople seem to forget this when faced with a problem. It happens. In fact, the client or customer calling to complain certainly has done something similar. If you address the situation correctly, you can turn a problem into a positive. If you don't, you can lose a client and damage your reputation. If you are really lucky, you will get sued!

As an attorney, I can't tell you how many times I have defended business clients in litigation because of how they handled a problem with a client. Instead of addressing the problem, business people tend to bury their heads in the sand as though it will just go away. Nothing infuriates a client or customer more. If you have clearly made a mistake, no lawyer is going to save you. If you failed to deliver a big shipment on the due date, there is nothing I can say to a judge or jury that is going to save you.

When you clearly have made a mistake, there is a proper course of action to take. First, deal with it up front and center. Admit the mistake and apologize for it. You would be surprised how far an apology will go with an unhappy client or customer. It takes an adversarial situation and turns it into something less.

The next step is to come up with a solution to the problem. You may have to bite the bullet on the solution, but it is going to be cheaper than hiring an attorney. It is also going to do worlds for your reputation. A business that "makes things right" is one that prospers. This is particularly true if you are in an industry where most businesses do not act as such.

If you are having a dispute with an unreasonable client, then defend yourself. If you clearly have made a mistake, however, make it right and clients will forgive you.

Richard A. Chapo is with SanDiegoBusinessLawFirm.com - providing limited liability company formation in California.