Challenge Three - The impact on legislation and procedures on customer service

Good morning year 11 BTEC Business

Today's challenge is to start to think about and UNDERSTAND the impact of legislation on customer service.

A summary of the legislation that might impact on customer service in a business is outlined below:

• Food Safety Act
• Sales of Goods Act
• Health and Safety at Work Act
• Data Protection Act
• Equal Opportunities Act 

For P3 you need to 'explain how organisational procedures and legislation contribute to consistent and reliable customer service'

You will need to summarise the the legislation in your own words rather than quoting from the Act of parliament and relate this to customer service policies from your chosen businesses.  The following layout is a suggestion of how your submission should look:

1. The first section should summarise the relevant customer service legislation.
2. The second section should describe the customer service policy of your chosen organisation.
3. The third section should explain how legislation and the organisation's policies contribute to or improve customer service .  You should ensure that you compare the impact on the law and the policies both from the point of view of the customer and of the organisation using appropriate examples.

For P4 you need to 'explain how legislative and regulatory requirements affect customer service in a selected business'

What are operational procedures?

• They could be the ways that a business monitor the effectiveness of their customer service.
• They could be 'codes of practice' that they have chosen to adopt. See Institute of Customer Service.
• They may involve processes that allow them to adopt ethical standards i.e. soil association, Red Tractor, Organic, Fair Trade, environmental etc.
• It may be as simple as dealing with refunds on guaranteed products and services up to 20 days, dealing with all customers equally, being bothered to refer  customers to other staff if you cannot answer their question
• It may be to do with minimizing risks and hazards - signs on wet floors, wet paint, fire exits, fire evacuation points, evacuation procedures and 

Why bother?

Organisational procedures contribute to consistent and reliable customer service allow you to get a competitive edge by:

1. meeting or exceeding the customer service offered by rival businesses
2. ensuring that the company mission statement / vision is followed.
3. ensuring certain quality benchmarks are set and maintained. 

M3 requires you to 'Compare the impact of legislative and regulatory requirements affecting customer service on a selected business 

Once you have competed P3 & P4 you will need to write a short report on the impact of legislative and regulatory requirements affecting customer service on a business of your choice. But use a business that you have already studied and use the evidence that you have found to support your writing in this task