Providing the Right Hours to Provide the Right Service

As part of Chapter 12 in our Marketing II course we discuss service. One aspect of service that we touch on is the providing of the service. For example:

A city bus can sit anywhere from 24 - 48 people. Does that bus only run when there are 2 people on it and what happens if there are more people wanting to use the bus? What does the bus company do?
Answers:
The bus will run with only one person on it. The cost to run that bus is the same with one person on it as it is with 48 people on it. However the bus will make more money with more people using it.
During peak times the bus company will run extra buses to keep up with the demand.

When providing a service the company must have enough equipment and staff to effectively provide the -service. Peak times for a city  bus is usually 7-9AM 11-1 PM and 4-6PM. Still that bus runs 24 hours a day seven days a week.

Newfoundland Power's equipment provides electricity 24/7. Health care is available 24/7.


WHY IS THIS NOT THE CASE WITH OTHER SERVICE PROVIDERS!?

A restaurant usually opens to cover off peak hours. A restaurant is usually open from 8AM - 8PM, give or take a few hours. This usually covers breakfast, dinner/lunch and supper. However, just like people travel 24/7, people also eat 24/7. It is clear that business during non-peak times would be slow and perhaps the business would not make any money some nights. But should a restaurant that provides a necessary service, that is food, be operating the same as other service providers. Many people who travel long distances rely on restaurants to get their meals and snacks. For 12 hours of the day these people may have to go without eating because no restaurants are open during the night hours in their area.

This is a sign for a real restaurant. As you can see they do not open until late in the morning. They completely overlook breakfast.

McDonalds and Tim Horton's in Clarenville are about the only places to get food between the hours of 12AM and 5AM. Even then only their drive thru is open. They may only see one or two customers between those hours but still they are available to public.

The same applies to things such as gas stations, speaking from personal experience. You never know when somebody might take sick in the night and you find yourself driving to the hospital at 2 in the morning. When you get to the hospital the gas light comes on and you know that you do not have enough gas to get home. You find yourself sitting next to a gas pump at 5 in the morning waiting for the gas station to open at 7.

People are always traveling and very few services such as food and gas is available to them 24 hours a day. Often these are needed. There are always people traveling and on the go. By opening these business, with reduced staff, they could potentially make money and have increased customer satisfaction. I think other select services should be providing better hours to their customers.

"I could dig through and get you another one, but I don't really want to!"

Within our marketing course one of the things we have discussed throughout the course is customer service. Customer service is key in a business to ensure that they receive continued business from its customers. The employees are told to treat their customers with care and compassion in most organizations. However in one particular Clarenville business I wonder if the employees have ever been told such a thing.

On Friday, February 4, 2011 myself and some friends decided to go bowling to pass the night away. We have attended Caribou Lanes on several occasions and have always found the service to be near satisfactory.  This particular night I was so shocked to get the attitude that I received from the staff. When she gave me my bowling shoes I noticed a tear in the side of the shoe about an inch long. I was not particular and did not ask for another shoe to replace it. I only picked the shoe up and looked at it. The worker looked at me and said "Is there a defect in the shoe?". I replied that there was but I was okay with it as the tear was only in the first layer. The worker replied "I COULD DIG THROUGH AND FIND YOU ANOTHER ONE, BUT I DON'T REALLY WANT TO!" I was absolutely shocked that has an employee they would present such a negative attitude to a customer. I could not believe it.

Are there no guidelines that this worker must follow? Even if she was having a bad day she can not have that kind of attitude at work. It makes a great community business look bad.

The benefits offered by the Tim Horton's Tim Card!

Almost everywhere you go these days they offer gift cards. Gift cards are fairly new to the marketing industry. Previously gift certificates were implemented as the way for the store to generate revenues. Though certificates are still available in some places they are slowly being replaced by the magnetic strip on a small plastic card.

Something that the market has only seen over the past few years are reloadable gift cards. An idea that Tim Horton's has taken and run with.

The Tim Horton's gift card is a pre-paid, reloadable cash card that you can use to pay for purchases at participating Tim Hortons restaurants. It is the convenient and easy way to pay! Once your card is loaded, you can swipe it to pay for purchases both in-store and at the drive thru at participating locations. Each time you use the Tim Card, the amount of your purchase will be deducted from the balance remaining. The new balance will be displayed on the reader.

One thing that the Tim's Card has that many other reloadable cards does not have is the ability to be interacted with over the internet.  Some of the options available with the Tim's Card online are:

• Protect your balance if your card is lost or stolen
• Reloading your card using a credit card
• Multiple card balance merge
• View your most recent transaction history

One interesting thing with Tim Cards is that they can be reloaded with a credit card. Bu using a credit card to reload the card you can set the card to be reloaded once a week, once a month or when the balance gets below a certain amount. 

The Tim's Card is a great way for Tim Horton's to increase their revenue. How often do you wish for that coffee and you never have any change on you or you don't want to break that twenty. The Tim's Card solves all those problems.