Four Ways of Improving Customer Service in a Medical Office

Customer service should always be the cornerstone and core value of any medical office.  It helps to better differentiate your practice from your competition, and positive customer referrals are always cheaper than paid advertising.  Since most medical practices treat ailments in a similar manner, with the same medication, the office staff at your medical practice has to provide top-notch customer service to gain an upper hand on the doctors down the street.

However, providing excellent customer service in a medical practice proves itself to be extremely difficult.  Patients arrive apprehensive about the appointments since few people truly want to actually go to the doctor.  When there are kids involved, the situation worsens further.  So in order to provide excellent customer service, medical office workers must go through extra steps to make the patients, because the clients often already arrive upset.

So, how can you best improve customer service in the medical office?  The easiest way to determine how to better service your patients is to ask them.  However, getting people to respond to surveys and then mail them back to the office is difficult for most practices.  Also, should you wait until the patient is checking out to hand them the survey, they rush through the questions because they are in a hurry to leave the office.  However, we have developed four ways that may help encourage your patients to provide you with comments and constructive criticism.

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1. Ask for Feedback from Patients

Give your patients a questionnaire that includes a self-addressed and prepaid envelope.  This prevents your customers from having to look for stamps or search for your address.  Also, this gives them extra time to answer the survey without feeling rushed.

2. Send an Email Survey to Encourage Feedback

Sending an email containing a link to a questionnaire via Survey Monkey could also encourage your patients to provide feedback on what was good about the customer experience at the medical office, and what areas could be improved upon.  This works especially well should your practice be younger and more computer savvy.

3. Gain New Perspectives and Understanding

If you are the person who manages the practice, try working the front desk and/or answering the phones once a week.  This best helps the person in charge understand how the business operates from a different vantage point.  This perspective also provides keen insight as to how you can better service your patients and external customers.

4. Be Accessible For Your Patients

Try posting a sign in the waiting area reminding your patients that your goal is to give everyone the best service possible.  Also, if the customers are unhappy with the service received, ask them to give you, the manager, a call, and explain what happened.

Implementing these actions can help you better serve your customers, leading to a more positive medical office customer experience. To learn more about how you can serve your customers, check out our pricing plans or contact us today!

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