Internal customer service: Examples, definition, and strategies

What is Internal Customer Service?

Providing excellent internal customer service is crucial for ensuring a smooth and productive work environment for employees. One typical example is the IT department, which addresses technical issues and troubleshooting for employees in other departments, such as sales.

In this case, if a sales employee has difficulty accessing their VoIP, they would contact the IT department for assistance.

Internal customer service encompasses various departments within a company that offer support to other departments, including HR, payroll, facility management, and marketing.

As these services are not directly customer-facing, they may take time to be obvious, but they play a vital role in maintaining an efficient workflow within the organization.

Who are Internal Customers?

External customers are individuals or organizations that purchase a product or service from your company. They are your business’s primary source of revenue, and their satisfaction is crucial to your company’s success.

Your customer service department is responsible for addressing any concerns or complaints, as they can seek out alternative providers and discontinue business with you. In essence, the reason for running a business is to cater to their needs. External customers are called “accounts” or “clients.”

On the other hand, internal customers are any individuals or groups within your organization that you provide service. These can include temporary workers, contractors, or full-time employees.

They all rely on one another to carry out the company’s tasks. In short, internal customers are all stakeholders within your business or those who are dependent on it. Internal customer service aims to assist others in improving external customer service.

Why is Internal Customer Service Important?

Internal customer service, also known as employee service, plays a crucial role in the smooth functioning of back-office operations. By providing a reliable and efficient service, employees can focus on their core responsibilities and minimize disruptions caused by technical issues.

Having an internal help desk can be beneficial for both employers and employees. For employers, it serves as a formal communication channel and a way to disseminate important information, such as security protocols, and protect employees and the company.

For employees, having access to internal knowledge and support allows them to quickly resolve problems that may impede their work, which leads to increased job satisfaction and motivation to stay with the company.

Strategies to Implement for Internal Customer Service

Here are some strategies that you can use to improve the internal customer service

Set a tone between departments

With internal stakeholders who don’t interact with customers, communication can be less formal and more conversational. This can streamline workflows and reduce unnecessary formality. However, professionalism should still be maintained.

Employees should address each other respectfully, using a casual and friendly tone. Building positive relationships is vital in the workplace. For example, a good relationship between a sales associate and an IT person can help the sales associate get their team’s computers upgraded quickly.

Make a schedule

Your internal customer service team is vital to your company, but they have their own responsibilities and workload. To ensure that their time is used efficiently, it’s essential to establish clear guidelines for what internal customers can expect.

This will help reduce communication gaps and ensure that your employees know when to reach out and how long they may need assistance. Setting a schedule for requests will also help the internal service team manage their workload in a more structured and efficient manner.

For instance, if employees are used to just walking into the IT department with their issues at any time, this can disrupt the workflow of the IT team. With a schedule in place, they’ll be able to manage all requests more efficiently.

Create long-run solutions

Having an internal customer service team to address problems is a great resource, but managing the symptoms and finding the root cause is essential. By doing so, you can provide long-term solutions that will prevent bottlenecks in the future.

For example, suppose the analytics team needs help connecting with data centers. In that case, it may be helpful to meet with the facility manager to devise a plan to eliminate the problem altogether.

This way, the facility manager can focus on more strategic tasks rather than constantly addressing minor, repetitive issues. By proactively addressing common problems, you can reduce the need for back-and-forth communication between employees and the internal customer service team.

Create multiple serving channels

Effective communication is crucial for ensuring that your employees can work efficiently and complete tasks promptly. To facilitate this, it’s important to establish multiple communication channels, such as email, SMS, live chat, and project management tools, to reach the internal customer service team.

Additionally, using a product roadmap tool can help track important events and deadlines and ensure that everyone has visibility into the progress of a project. By implementing a transparent workflow, each team member and stakeholder can easily understand the project’s status, reducing confusion and unnecessary questions.

This may seem overwhelming at first, but it will ultimately make your employees’ jobs more accessible by providing them with faster access to internal customer services, resulting in increased productivity.

Explain to the internal customers how to problem can be solved

When an issue arises, the employee who raised the concern may be able to solve it independently. This saves time for the internal customer service team and empowers the employee to find solutions on their own.

To facilitate this, consider creating resource pools for employees to reference when dealing with repetitive issues. Additionally, departments can develop guidelines or a helpful book that provides step-by-step instructions and explains the root cause of common problems. This helps employees troubleshoot on their own but also helps internal customers understand the source of their issues.

Examples of Internal Customer Service

• Providing a dedicated email address for employees to send questions to the support team, such as techsupport@companyname.com or hr@companyname.com
• Developing a centralized help center where employees can find answers to common questions and access up-to-date information about company benefits and policies
• Implementing a web form for employees to describe their issues and select from a drop-down menu to indicate the type of problem they’re experiencing
• Offering live chat support for quick back-and-forth exchanges with the internal support team
• Utilizing Slack channels or Slack integration to connect with support team members for assistance

Conclusion

Internal customer service is vital to any organization as it ensures that employees have the support they need to perform their duties effectively.

There are various ways to provide internal customer service, such as setting up dedicated email addresses, creating a centralized help center, implementing web forms, offering live chat support, and utilizing communication tools like Slack channels.

Organizations can improve communication and workflow and increase productivity by providing multiple channels for employees to reach out for assistance.

Additionally, by proactively addressing common problems and providing long-term solutions, internal customer service can help reduce the need for back-and-forth communication and save time for employees and the internal customer service team.

Overall, effective internal customer service is critical for any organization’s smooth operation and success.