Customer care in hospitality

Introduction
McDonald’s is the biggest fast food service company in the world. McDonalds provide a fast food meals and soft drink to eat in restaurant or take away. McDonald which is located near the Broadway centre is providing a better service to the customers. This outlet is getting very busy in peak hours due to its location. It is in the centre of a major public transport hub. This outlet is established from last 30 years.
There are 32,000 restaurants, who served 55 million people in a day. McDonald’s having an outlet in more than 118 countries all over the world. McDonalds first opened in California, USA. In 1940 Mr. ray Kroc take over a franchisee of the McDonalds brother (Dick and Mac) and started opening the new restaurant according to the McDonalds concept. In 1974, McDonalds started his first restaurant in United Kingdom. As of 31st December 2001, McDonalds and his franchisees running over 1,184 outlets in the United Kingdom.

The reason to choose this organization because McDonald gives the best quality of foods and beverages to the customers in a lower price. McDonalds gives high standard of service to achieve their customer expectations. McDonalds knows the value of customer.
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Types of Customers:
Customer:
Customers are actual who purchase the Product / Services.
Hospitality Industry Customer– Hospitality having a various kind of Customer which is depends on their Needs, Budget, Expectations and Satisfaction. This Hospitality business had different types of customer which include Families, Teenagers and Business Clientele etc.
1. Teenagers:
It is cheaper than other organizations. So, most of teenagers find it more affordable and some McDonald outlets offer a internet facilities in their restaurants, which is become common in most of the restaurants to increase the customers. Lots of the teenagers find easier to take a quick bite, which save more time of teenagers. There is also a student discount.
2. Families: (Parents and Children)
Most of the children love to have a food and Beverages in McDonalds so, many families take their children to enjoy the McDonald environment. There are different types of menu which includes light and heavy food. McDonald also research the health issues of the customer. Most of the McDonald serves the health conscious food in their outlets for examples; they are using less salt and oil in the food to provide the health conscious food to every customer.
3. Business clientele:
Business customer are always in rush for working in the morning. Normally Business customers always have a short period of time to spend a break. So, they prefer the McDonald for takeaway according to their needs and expectations. McDonald provide a quick and efficient service to the business people without wasting their priceless time.
McDonalds which is located in Hammersmith Broadway, there are Disney store where the families are coming with their children to do the shopping for the kids. This McDonald has a many number of customers because of it location, like tube station and shopping mall are nearby to the McDonald. So, therefore that outlet having a different types of age group customers. The price of McDonald keeps on changing but the McDonald at Hammersmith Broadway has a happy meal for the kid’s party at Just 5.99 pound. The starting and closing time of the McDonald at Hammersmith Broadway is Monday to Sunday (6.00a.m to 23.00p.m) But on Friday it open till 12.00a.m in night. McDonald at Hammersmith Broadway provides a best service to the customer and they know the value of the customers. Also, they know how to make a profit to the organization to keeps a guest happy.
McDonald’s Corporation (2008)
Customer Care policy:
1. Quick service:
According to their services McDonalds gives a 100% satisfactions to the customer McDonald ensure that each and every order goes correctly and always double checked done by the team members. If any mistake has been done in the customer order and they are not satisfied with their service, McDonald policy is that to make it correct by offer complementary meal to the customer for service recovery.
McDonalds have different types of policy while dealing with customer. They follow first order goes first and then to second order. According to this policy the operation always remain smooth and the customers always be happy with the efficient service. This policy helps them to work easily and provide excellent and quality service to the customer.
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2. Quality policy:
The management of McDonald’s constantly strives to:
1) Improving its standards of food safety and hygiene
2) Providing excellent customer service
3) Food safety programmes and Assurance of quality.
4) Control of every link in its supply chain.
Management of mcdonalds is committed to maintain the highest standards in terms of quality,value and cleanliness. The management is fully determined in exceeding its customer needs in the way of quality assurance and foof safety programmes. Effective communication on all the levels is the key for keeping tracks of guest complaints and following up with necessary measures.
3. Equal opportunities policy(Internal customer policy):
According to the policy, every employee had equal rights. So, employees love to work comfortable in a proper environment. There is no discrimination of age, nationality, disabled, ethnic origin, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, race, and colour. They prefer if you make your staff happy than staff will make your guest happy. Every employee treated with respect and provided training and development educations to improve their skills and knowledge , so that training would make them professional towards their work, it includes health and safety, secure working, hygiene and environment. Any employee who is found guilty for unlawful discrimination may face disciplinary action.
http://www.bized.co.uk/comfact/mcdonalds/mc15.htm
Importance of Effective Customer care in hospitality:
Customer Service is the essence of hospitality industry. Customers are the back bone for the success of any organisation. Effective communication on all levels of the organisation is very important to impress or disappoint each customer.
Every hotelier should be attentive and passionate about customer needs. If the customers are satisfied, you are building a relationship based on trust and loyalty. If the organization is successful in meeting the customer needs, then the customers are more likely to come again to the hotels or become regular customer for that organisation. Some organisation may provide the best service, but they are not fast enough, hence it may lose the important customers and several other referrals.
McDonalds always strives to take good care of their customers and provide a service that exceeds customers expectations by providing and offering various options in their menu and encouraging the customers for any feedback or suggestions. McDonald works on the principle that the customer needs to be treated with priority and he should see value as well as quality in what he gets.
Every management tries its level best to meet or exceed the customer expectations as it the only mantra for any organization to increase its revenue. The happier customers are more likely to spend more at your establishment. If they are given some small discounts or vouchers, it is more likely that they some back the next day and spend even more on of the other products of your organization. If the staff is friendly and polite it acts as cherry on the cake as the customers some back knowing that they will get a good customer service with a smile and acknowledgment.
McDonald believes that it’s better to find a solution for a problem rather than running away from it. The staff are given appropriate training to deal any consequences or problems hence McDonald always encourages its associates to solve any problems which also motivates and builds confidence in them and makes the customer happy making a good impression of the organization. McDonalds’ provides highest level of quality, food, service and hygiene at each and every restaurant. The key for its success is constantly monitoring and keeping a track of guest complaints and acting on the feedbacks given by customers to make necessary changes in terms of service, food, quality, and value for money which urges the customers to come back again and again.
McDonalds encourages all its associates and customer care department to be open for any feedback from the customers and act on it. Meeting the customer needs is very important for any organization to make profit and for that it is very important to recognize what the customer wants and how much is willing to pay for it.
Evaluate the Customer Care policy:
Why to evaluate?
a) Internal customer:
By evaluating the internal customer of a specific age helps to built a relationship with the same age group customers. By checking the evaluation of internal customer and the policies which were implied by the company for the customer helps us to know the benefit of the policy which was implemented.
b) Position of the Organisation:
By evaluating the organisation comes to know the position, strength, weakness and rating. It helps to compare the organisation with other competitor. There is some point’s like-
What’s going on in the market?
What are the competitor’s policies?
How the Organisation will use it in an effective way?
c) Trends:
There are different types of trends in the market. By evaluating we come to know the latest trends in the market and new technology through which guest will be attracted.
d) Targets:
Every organisation has a goals and targets. It is also helps to complete the targets and achieve the goals of the company and to get the regular business.
How to evaluate?
a) Listening to the customer:
It is very important in any organisation to listen to the customer complaints or suggessions in order to meet or exceed his expectations. According to Avril owton Customer love to share and talk about their experience and give suggestions to improve the service or standards.
b) Provide appropriate tranning to the staff:
It is the staff who represents your organisation, in other words they are the face of your organisation. It is the staff who will delever the final product to the customer an make him happy. Hence the primary objective of any organisation to keep iots policies intact is to providew appropriate traning to its staff in terms of the service to be delivered better than the competitors. (William.bmartin,1993)
c) Analysis of customer complaints and feedback at your regular intervals:
It is very important for any oraganisation to analyse the customer complaints as well act on it as soon as possible to win the customers loyalty. Organisation should also give a proper feedback to the customers.(avril owton)
Conclusion
It is clear that the good customer service is vital in any kind of business. The good customer care always performs best in front of the guest. In results, the satisfied customers always return to the business and give the profit to the organisation. According to the McDonalds “success of their restaurant is gained through their customer”. McDonalds build a good reputation with a customer so, they knows the expectation and demand of the customer always been change. McDonalds always do a market research from which they got information about customer likes and dislikes. According to market research McDonald implement the new things to attract the customer. They know if the customers receive the good service than the customer will be regular for the organisation