國際貿易輕鬆學的部落格

誠意 + 同理心 = 解決之道
 

Vivian 在一家貼紙製品公司負責外銷工作，她手上有位大客戶每一季都會固定下單，金額不小。但是上一季的訂單曾因原料供應商延誤交貨，而無法準時上線生產，致使船期延後一週，未能依照原先的承諾如期出貨，這已使客人十分不悅，沒想到這次又發生同樣的狀況，原料供應商再度延遲交貨，而且一慢還慢了半個月。 

雖然 Vivian 試圖向客人解釋錯不在她，並且將加速趕工交貨，但是客人已經失去耐性與信心，並表明這次的延誤將使他無法對買主交代，也可能因而失去訂單，茲事體大。該客人對 Vivian 發出以下信函，大有取消此訂單，並從此撒喲那拉的意味。 

Dear Vivian,

Received your email of October 12, 2005 with your explanation for the delay. Unfortunately, your late shipment will result in a cancellation of a major order to us. 

We do not want you to rush and send a defective or inferior product; however this is not the first time that you have failed to keep a promised ship date. We totally cannot accept this kind of service from one of our vendors. 

Sincerely,

John Smith 


Vivian 與老闆商量之後，決定不惜代價全力挽救這筆生意和這位大客戶。老闆同意以 UPS 快遞方式，在 10 月 20 日前將貨送到客人手上，讓客人能如期收到貨，對他的買主得以交代，信譽不至受損。於是 Vivian 準備發出以下信函向客人說明現況： 


Dear Mr. Smith,

We are very sorry that we delay the shipment again. 

We don't want to delay the shipment at all, this is as a result of delay by our supplier. However, in order to ship the goods as soon as possible that our workers had overworked to rush the production last weekend. We would like to inform you that the shipment will be arranged by UPS at no charge for you to express our apologies. Meanwhile, the goods will be arrived at your company before Oct 20th. We hope that we could redeem your damage as much as possible. 

We hope that we can keep our business with you.
We look forward to hearing from you.

With apologies once again.

Yours sincerely

Vivian


如果你是這位買主 Mr. Smith，不知你看完這封信有什麼感想？雖然可以明瞭賣方有提出解決問題的方法，但是誠意和歉意顯然不足，尤其還一直表示錯不在自己，而且也沒有徵求客人同意，一付幫客人做主決定的樣子。Vivian 在寄出這封信之前可能也覺得不妥，所以請 AYA 提供一點意見，希望可以增加一些說服力，提高成功機率。以下是 AYA 幫 Vivian 代擬的回函內容： 


Dear Mr. Smith,

We know our repeated delay caused you big troubles and we have no excuses to ask for any forgiveness from you. But we still tried our best to work for your order over weekend and have completed all of the pending items with satisfied quality in hand now.

We would like to get your permission whether you still allow these goods to be shipped? If you could kindly give us a chance, we will ship these goods by UPS at our own cost to ensure an earliest arrival at your company no later than Oct. 20th. 

We hope such arrangement will lessen your loss and get the orders back from your customers in time. For your further orders, we will adopt the raw material from new reliable suppliers to avoid such problems happened again . 

If there are any valuable comments from you or your customers, please keep us informed, we will do our utmost to match your request for sure. 

Again, please accept our sincere apologies. We await your instruction in order to arrange the shipment by UPS without delay.

Thanks & best regards,

Vivian 


最後 Vivian 寄出了AYA 的版本，並於當天獲得客人回覆，欣然同意依照 Vivian 的安排來出貨。其實寫商業書信不只是文法正確，或是把事情交代清楚就好，你一定要站在客人的角度，以同理心去揣摩他的想法與心態，針對問題找出方法而不要一直強調誰對誰錯，如果你能展現解決問題的誠意與負責的態度，並真心表達歉意與尊重，相信客人還是會樂於將你列入長期供應商的名單之中。