Three golden words: 'Good customer service'

Learning about the interview process and how to better present oneself throughout the first Leicester Award I completed (Experience employability) helped me to grasp an understanding on how the job interview process works (having only had more informal interviews up until that point). This enabled me to better prepare myself; researching the company I was applying to, researching potential questions and planning answers, as well as taking care of my appearance to give a good first impression, all of which resulted in a good interview and then receiving a job offer to work as a sales assistant, at Tommy Hilfiger. 

However the real skill I was hoping to practice further, through working in a retail environment, was my customer service skills and as an added bonus, improve my interpersonal skills. 

Recently I had a situation in which to give good customer service was a challenge. A lady that had wanted to try on several dresses, had a fitting room curtain pole fall down on her. On top of this she had a difficult outfit to find on a very busy, hot day and when she came to pay, the till stopped working. 
Despite all of this I remained cool and calm, and took each issue as it came- as well as making light of an unusual situation and having a laugh! Firstly I put discarded the pole and instead engaged the lady in conversation by asking about the occasion for which she was buying the outfit (unusually she needed to find the ugliest dress for a bizarre hen night- the incident only got more and more strange...). By communicating effectively, I was able to find out the issue she was having and then use my knowledge of the store to give her quicker answers. Also dealing with each problem in order, meant that neither her nor I became too overwhelmed. I was able to build a mini rapport with the customer, which led her to also buying another item. Furthermore it meant that when there were problems at the till point I could continue the light and slightly humorous conversation, so that she still left the store in a positive disposition and therefore more likely to shop there again.  

I felt that I was able to further my ability to provide good customer service in difficult circumstances. There is always a way to help a customer and make a positive impression even if it is a bad situation. Overall this experience taught me how good customer relations and service can keep a customer happy against all the odds. Now I make sure that I know what each customer is looking for or if they are not searching for anything in particular, I let them know that I am here to help. 

I believe that by continually working on my customer service skills I am also bettering my interpersonal skills. This in turn has given a boost to my own confidence and I know that it is now a skill that I can call upon in any part of my life. 

After doing a little research on the matter of Good Customer Service, I realise that I have learnt more through experiencing it first hand rather than learning through reading or talking about it in training. This has highlighted how useful reflection has been.
However this website has some good concise points that consolidate what I now put into action on a daily basis. 

http://marketing.about.com/od/relationshipmarketing/a/crmtopten.htm

Therefore I feel that over the course of working at Tommy Hilfiger, training on the job, but more importantly taking action in real life situations, have both allowed me to build upon and refine the foundation that I already had.