Tax season has the largest concentration of clients and presents the best opportunity to find out what clients think about your services. It also creates an opportunity for additional services.
Many firms are reluctant to ask clients to present their opinions of their performance because they fear a negative response, but that is actually the best reason for providing that opportunity. Clients who complain usually do not want to terminate the relationship, but want it to improve. Clients who do not want to salvage the relationship will not respond; they will just leave when it suits their situation.
There is a fivefold purpose to ask clients to evaluate your services: 1) To find out what clients think about your services so you can make improvements; 2) To make clients aware of added services you could provide for them; 3) To provide ways and reasons for clients to refer you to friends, associates and colleagues; 4) To repair fractured relationships; and, 5) To perhaps find an overlooked gem of a service you are performing for some clients that could be transferred to other clients.
The evaluation or client survey should contain questions that can easily be rated on a scale, such as 1 to 5, with room for comments. The questions should ask about overall satisfaction; responsiveness and competence of staff and partners; admin interactions; user-friendly deliverables and instructions; handling of any errors; promptness in responding to clients’ calls, emails and questions; dependable availability; proactivity in trying to help clients with added planning; fees; and the value and benefits of the services and of using your firm. These questions can be placed on one or two pages. Another page can be a listing of added services the client might need, think they need, would want now or at some point in the future, or something they are unsure of and would like information about. Space can also be included for an entry if they know of anyone who could benefit from any of the services listed, asking them to either provide their name and contact info, or if they would be kind enough to call and tell them about us and what we could do to assist them. Occasionally a client could add a comment about something that was done for them that would highlight it as something that could be expanded upon for others.
Those who express dissatisfaction in any manner or who indicated they might want additional services should get an immediate call from a partner. At some point the responses should be tabulated and reviewed in the aggregate, the object being to improve client services and perception of services, and maybe uncover a trend (good or bad). Your services could be perfect, but the perception might not match that reality. If that is your situation, then this would also need to be worked on.
Those who do not respond should be sent a second request. After that, the non-responders should be considered either happy or not (that is a pretty bright assumption by me!). To determine which, you need an honest and realistic appraisal of your services for those clients. If you deem a client happy, then I suggest doing nothing. Those you feel were misserved should be called to provide the client time for some venting and complaining. No one likes to be on the receiving end of that, but it is necessary if you want to retain that client. If you do not mind losing that client, then do nothing.
These surveys can be beneficial. For example, one client gave us the highest ratings on everything, including the value, but when asked about the fairness of our fees, he said we were very high priced. I called him immediately and had a long discussion to describe everything we did, all of the people working on his data and their expertise, the timeliness and responsiveness, to show him that the value was significantly greater than what was expected. The following month he referred two friends to us. Another time a client complained about errors on her return and the difficulty in getting them fixed. My call was to offer apologies and assurances that that type of work would not be repeated, that I would make sure our procedures would be changed so those types of errors would not reoccur, and that I would personally sign off on everything done on her behalf. That was many years ago, but she is still a client and has availed herself of added services numerous times.
If you never used client evaluations or surveys, consider them now. Afterward, you can include them with every client deliverable. Client surveys are a great way to get feedback and additional business. Try it. It is effective.
Do not hesitate to contact me at
Edward Mendlowitz, CPA, is partner at
