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The Customer Service Management Process

Chapter  in  The International Journal of Logistics Management · January 2004

DOI: 10.1108/09574090310806576

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Yemisi A Bolumole A. Michael Knemeyer

Michigan State University The Ohio State University
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Douglas M. Lambert
The Ohio State University
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 CHAPTER
The Customer Service
4 Management Process
A. Michael Knemeyer, Douglas M. Lambert and
Sebastián J. García-Dastugue

Overview
The customer service management process is responsible for administering the
product and service agreements (PSAs) developed by customer teams as part of the
customer relationship management process.1 The key differentiating factor between
the traditional customer service activity and the customer service management
process is that the process is primarily proactive. The process involves the
development of triggers and signals to identify situations that may become problems
before they affect the customer so that the promises made in the PSA can be
achieved without interruption. Standardized response procedures are developed to
respond to recurring events and coordination mechanisms are put in place to deal
with irregular events. Information systems are developed to provide visibility to the
triggers and signals that identify events requiring a response. In this chapter, we
describe the customer service management process in detail to show how it can be
implemented and managed. To do this, we identify the activities of each strategic
and operational sub-process; evaluate the interfaces with the business functions and
the other seven supply chain management processes; and describe examples of
successful implementation.

Introduction
In a competitive In a competitive business environment, management needs to implement the
business environment, customer service management process in order to proactively respond to situations
management needs to before they negatively impact the customer. It is this proactive perspective that makes
implement the the customer service management process different from the customer service
customer service activity in logistics. The customer service group in logistics is where customers might
management process call in to place orders; to inquire about an order that has not arrived as scheduled; to
in order to proactively complain about damaged products, invoice errors, products shipped in error; and/or
respond to situations to change an order. It might be argued that the greater the number of calls to the
before they negatively
customer service group, the more service failures customers are experiencing and
impact the customer.
thus a more appropriate name might be customer non-service group.

1
This chapter is adapted from Yemisi A. Bolumole, A. Michael Knemeyer and Douglas M. Lambert,
“The Customer Service Management Process,” The International Journal of Logistics Management, Vol.
14, No. 2 (2003), pp. 15-31.

SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT 69

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