My wife and I had our first child back in May. For almost the entire 9 months leading up to his birth, we were visiting the ob/gyn doctor for checkups.
The bills started rolling in weeks after our son’s arrival. Most of these were accompanied by their matching insurance payments. However, the insurance company kept rejecting bills for any medical care associated with our newborn son. The insurance company claimed that he hadn’t yet been added to our policy.
Despite the insurance company seeing 9 months of prenatal care, labor and delivery charges for mom, and related hospital stay, they couldn’t figure out that we now had a kid that should be on our policy!
This partly defies common sense and logic. However, I had not yet submitted a form to my employer stating I now had a child because I was in the hospital with the baby or at home on paternity leave. Because of this missing paperwork, the insurance company flatly rejected all medical bills for my son. This caused headaches for our family and increased workload for the insurance company who had to reprocess all our claims. Don’t let this happen to your business!
Pay Attention
Your customers drop hints about their situations every time they interact with your business. Are you paying attention? Can you anticipate their needs based on past behavior?
You’ll see patterns emerging in their purchases that can help you plan your inventory. You may notice their typical delay in paying your bills. Some customers will always buy the same products. What patterns do you see in your customer base? Do you really know what kind of customers you have?
Make the Conclusion
Put the pieces of the puzzle together and take the next logical step. You’ll be able to make the customer successful and your company can avoid lots of potential surprises.