Job Discussion Forums

[Omeo]

I understand the eikaiwa are big on customer service, but I haven't read any examples of the kind of customer service problems they typically run into or how often a typical school hears any kind of complaints. Can anyone give me any examples of what I might expect?

[luckyloser700]

There are lots of obvious answers to this question and they aren't worth typing.

Some school managers are pretty pushy about instructors talking with students and prospective students during breaks and in between classes. When students come and see no instructors present in the lobby or see the instructors running for the staff room, they get bummed out. A big complaint from students is that the atmosphere of the school lobby and other ouside-the-classroom areas is often not very lively and not very inivting.

Some schools expect not only the Japanese staff, but foreign teachers as well, to bring beverages to students and prospective students sitting in the lobby. This one's not so common, but not unheard of either.

[gaijinalways]

Many complaints fall in the teaching style category; i.e. using the book too much (or not at all), the teacher not being friendly, the teacher asking too many personal questions (believe it or not, asking about someone's job is sometimes construed as a personal question), etc.

[japan_01]

wearing a cologne, yawning, sneezing, crossing your legs (shows superiority), having fluff on your suit are just a few of the complaints that customers have.

[Omeo]

Granted I've never taught before, but I don't imagine I'd mind talking to students in the lobby; especially if the school wants me to. As far as the teaching style, I guess I just plan on teaching however they want me to teach. If they want me to use the book more or less or whatever, that's fine. I don't know what I could do about the rest of those complaints except maybe apologize and try not to do them again.

I'm basicly trying to figure out what to tell them at the interview when they ask how I'll deal with customer complaints.

[Apsara]

The only complaint I got in my 6 years of eikaiwa was that I translated a word into Japanese for a student instead of explaining it in English- this was enough for him to complain to the manager I had other students who wanted words translated for them- it's hard to please all the people all of the time. Students are paying quite a lot so they tend to have high expectations and complain about all sorts of things, sometimes legetimate, sometimes not.

Thank goodness I wasn't expected to sit and chat with students in the lobby during my breaks- I liked my job, but it was a job and my breaks were breaks, not a time to continue doing my job for free. I would always greet the students and smile of course, but then head for the staffroom!

[luckyloser700]

[Omeo]

I see your point about the breaks, Apsara. I guess if they insist on me talking during the breaks, we're gonna talk about what I wanna talk about; like "Know any good clubs around here?"

[seastarr]

When I worked for Nova, the only complaints I got were when I first started, a few students said that my rate of speech was too fast. I got maybe 2 in my first 2 weeks. I had two pretty good TIs, and they felt that students should be comfortable with any rate of speech and if they were planning to use their English skills, they should deal with it. After that, I had a few nice comments about my kids teaching and some students told me that I had slowed down on my own. I dont know if I actually slowed down, or they just got used to my accent. No one mentioned my dragging speech when I got back to Canada. As for talking to students in my down time, this never happened. Japanese staff asked me to come say hello to some students who were considering signing a couple of times, but this was always on my free lessons, when no one had booked in, or a student hadn't showed up. I never minded doing this, as they were paying me anyway, and it was a nice change from stamping or stuffing ads into tissue. It was never a really big thing, just a "hello" and where I was from. I have heard other companies have other expectations of their teachers between classes, but with Nova, we were only responsible for marking files and picking a lessons for the next class. This was supposed to take about 4 mins of the 10-15 break between lessons. It usually did, as long as there were no problems with the files and you didnt write any personal comments. I always wrote the comments if I had time, so I wasnt left with as much free time as the teachers who checked some boxes. For the most part, any complaints I ever heard about were for teachers who probably deserved them, for doing things like hitting on students, or talking about themselves for 40 mins and not teaching a lesson. I also heard students complain about other students and I was asked about this a few times. This mostly pertained to mouthy guys in voice class.