In a report you are required to critique the role of employee and customer engagement in customer service delivery with a focus on the customer engagement cycle in relation to Ikea.
Chelsea Jacobson awaited the arrival of her bed and dresser one Saturday in September. She’d
purchased the items in the IKEA Brooklyn store twelve days before, and couldn’t wait to finally be
done with sleeping on the floor of her apartment. She needed to be well rested as she headed to
her writing job in Hell’s Kitchen.
Although she’d been given a delivery window for the furniture to arrive, her bed and dresser never came.
She contacted the shipping company, XPO Logistics, to get an update on the status of her items, but
XPO notified her that IKEA had never supplied the order. Jacobson contacted IKEA numerous times
and eventually found out it could take an additional 4-6 weeks for her items to arrive, as they had been misplaced.
Jacobson joins the ranks of customers who have fallen victim to IKEA’s troubled customer service.
After attempts to contact the company via email and phone proved unsuccessful, she turned to
Twitter to voice her complaints and warn others, only to find thousands of similar tweets concerning
IKEA. From no-show deliveries to damaged packages and failed assembly, IKEA is leaving a trail of
frustrated customers who are simply unable to get the company to respond to their complaints. And
there doesn’t seem to be anything IKEA is doing to improve its service.
Jacobson talked with various case managers at IKEA, each offering a different solution to her issue,
none of which actually resulted in the delivery of her items or compensation. Eventually she got her
own vehicle and picked up the items herself.
Cat Jackson, who works as a project manager at a digital product studio in Chelsea, felt frustrated
by IKEA’s delivery process, especially since her job focuses on workflow and communication. On
September 15, two weeks after her originally scheduled delivery date, she received half of her items
after spending hours on the phone with XPO and IKEA representatives pleading her case for delivery.
The couch she received was so dirty and the bed frame was so damaged that she jam-packed the
items into her Kia Soul the next day and returned them to the store. Three weeks after her scheduled
delivery date, not one of her items had been successfully delivered. “It was difficult if not impossible
to reach IKEA customer service during this entire experience,” said Jackson. “The reality is no one
would have taken any reasonable measures to provide me with satisfactory service if I hadn’t raised
a fuss.” Yet she is still waiting for her other items.
The success of the Procurement System at IKEA
The new planning centralized concept at IKEA has been successful since it was implemented in the
2000s. One of the contributing factors to this success has been creating a sustainable relationship
with suppliers. The company introduced a code of conduct for suppliers using the IWAY or simply
IKEA’s way of purchasing. Suppliers are expected to adhere to certain standards for their continued
relationship with the company. IKEA has an elaborate communications and relationship
management strategy that it uses to engage manufacturers and materials suppliers. With over 1,800
suppliers in over 50 countries, the company has 42 trading service offices to maintain a healthy
relationship with suppliers. Additionally, the company makes a long-term commitment to suppliers
through signed contracts. For instance, as mentioned earlier, some suppliers get guaranteed
volumes that they should fulfill within periods of up to 18 months.
The company also employs in-store logistics to oversee the reordering of products. The in-store
logistics team is tasked with managing inventory at every store around the world. For instance, every
store has an in-store logistics manager whose work is to reorder goods. Additionally, a store goods
manager is available to handle materials logistics in every store. The logistics teams are required to
monitor and record deliveries together with sales to feed data into the system on the need to
replenish stock.
In a report you are required to critique the role of employee and customer engagement in customer service delivery with a focus on the customer engagement cycle in relation to Ikea.
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