A number of research projects have suggested key areas to attend to if you are interested in improving the level of the service that you provide. These models suggest that of good customer service includes Responsiveness, Assurance, Tangibles, Empathy and Reliability or RATER for short. While there are commonly acceptable meanings for these terms, it is important that organisational participants be provided an opportunity to create their own definitions and meanings specifically in the context of your organisation.

Responsiveness means:

• Prompt service to customers

• Willingness to help customers
• Readiness to respond to customers' requests
• Going out of the way to make customers happy
• And specifically in our organisation, responsiveness means to perform well on ________________________

Assurance means:

• Employees who instill confidence in customers

• Making customers feel safe in their transactions