INDIANAPOLIS BUSINESS JOURNAL
This week
VOL. 24 NO. 44, JANUARY 5-11, 2004
Solving the mystery behind customer service
Some health care offices take a fresh approach
By Tom Murphy
IBJ Reporter
When Kim Lemberg goes mystery shopping, she starts work before she even enters the doctor's office or health care center she's assigned to inspect.
She looks for proper outdoor lighting. She checks whether signs clearly indicate where she should go.
Once inside the doctor's office, she scans the waiting room. Are the magazines shredded and scattered? Is a receptionist "chomping on her gum 400 mph?" Are people friendly and helpful?
She then poses as a patient and talks to office employees who have no idea she's testing them.
Lemberg never buys anything on these shopping trips. Instead, she molds all her observations into a report for business owners that some say offers more feedback than the best customer satisfaction surveys.
The Fort Wayne resident's job as a mystery shopper is nothing new in the world of marketing. Banks, electronic stores and other retail outlets have used mystery shoppers for years, according to Charlie Larson, president of the Indianapolis chapter of the American Marketing Association.
Manufacturers sometimes do it to see whether retailers properly train employees who sell their product. But Larson has never heard of the practice being used in medicine.
Lemberg works for Indianapolis-based Perception Strategies Inc. She and other mystery shoppers call health care centers across the country at the owner's request. They also make in-person visits and sometimes stay overnight at a hospital, all in the name of customer service.
"It all comes down to, are they there to do a job and collect a paycheck, or are they there to perform good, quality customer service?" Lemberg said.
Lemberg does most of her work over the phone. She calls each health care office with a scenario made up to suit whatever her client wants. In one case, she called a doctor's office to report she had a child with a high fever and a sore throat. She needed to see the doctor immediately.
One receptionist worked to find room in the doctor's schedule. At another office, an employee told her, "Well, I ain't got nothing until March."
For in-person visits, mystery shoppers may feign the flu or some other illness to get an appointment or waiting room visit, said Lori Erickson Trump, director of sales and marketing for Perception Strategies. Sometimes the actor visits for a legitimate reason, like a mammogram.
Other times, they may simply ask an employee for directions to another part of the hospital.
"The employees do not know they're being shopped; that's our big thing," Trump said.
A 24-hour stay requires a more elaborate ruse. A mystery shopper may feign a migraine or a bad case of the flu. Sometimes another shopper accompanies the person to the hospital, posing as family.
Hospital administrators know the patient and family member are actors, and so does the "treating" physician. But no one else does.
"What we're looking for is obviously their patient experience," said Kevin Billingsley, Perception Strategies president. "The whole concept is to improve the experience for customers."
The typical Perception Strategies client is a major health care system that wants shoppers to check several clinics or lobbies. The cost varies between a few thousand dollars to more than $100,000.
Health care mystery shopping has grown in popularity the past few years, according to Mark Skaja, vice president of mission services for St. Rita's Medical Center in Lima, Ohio.
St. Rita's has worked with Perception Strategies about four years on several projects. He said mystery shopping offers more detail on customer service than a patient survey. It also gives information to administrators much quicker than a survey, which can take weeks or months to turn around.
"You recognize right away, someone who does it very well ... and you can see the people who don't have those skills," Skaja said.
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Shopping for service
Mystery shoppers may check for the following at health care offices:
Over the telephone:
-- Are calls answered by the third ring?
-- Is there music for callers on hold?
In person:
-- Are chairs clean?
-- Do employees have visible name tags?
-- Do employees make eye contact when talking to customers?
Source: Kim Lemberg, Perception Strategies Inc.
