Customer service: presenting an outcome without steering the choice
Presenting a service in a favourable light may seem compatible with good customer service, provided the facts remain accurate. The managerial question is more specific: how can staff inform customers without allowing the choice between positive and negative wording to decide on their behalf?
What the literature establishes
Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman (1981, Science) showed that different formulations of the same decision problem can alter expressed preferences. In their experiments, describing consequences as gains or losses notably influences choices between a certain option and a risky one. Factual accuracy alone therefore does not guarantee a neutral presentation.
Framing also affects evaluation
Irwin P. Levin and Gary J. Gaeth (1988, Journal of Consumer Research) studied the evaluation of a product whose same attribute was expressed positively or negatively. Their experiment on the presentation of ground beef shows that framing can influence judgement, and that its effect is weaker when participants taste the product before receiving the information. This extends beyond choices involving risk: the description of an attribute can already alter an evaluation.
The premature conclusion
One might conclude that good customer service should always favour positive wording. These studies establish an ability to steer judgements, not the legitimacy of using it to secure a customer's agreement. In the SHR — Swiss Human Resources “Accueil client” programme, the learning objective can be framed differently: making information understandable without concealing its relevant counterpart. (our executive and employee training programmes)
What these findings cannot guarantee
These experiments do not directly address interactions at a service desk in Sion, nor do they demonstrate that presenting both frames eliminates every bias. Findings about risky decisions and those about product evaluations are not interchangeable. Presenting both sides of an outcome is therefore a precaution to test, rather than a validated method for every customer-service situation.
A practical check in Sion
In Sion, a team could select information that is already documented: work completed or postponed in hydropower, administrative files complete or requiring further information in healthcare, orders fulfilled or unfulfilled in wine production, or excursions operating or cancelled in Alpine tourism. Across comparable situations, it could alternate between its usual wording and a presentation of both complementary outcomes, using the same period and denominator without inventing any rates. The main measure would be the proportion of people able to recall both outcomes correctly and explain what the information actually allows them to anticipate for their own request. Greater commercial acceptance without better understanding would not, on its own, constitute an improvement in customer service. To go further: explore the Client Reception training in Sion in the canton of Valais, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
In pictures: Client Reception in Sion
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