Company: Service Express, Grand Rapids, MI
Company Description: Since 1986, Service Express has been delivering on-site hardware maintenance for mission critical servers. SEI maintains servers and storage in data centers for hospitals, universities, government agencies and other companies from 28 offices in 12 states. SEI continually expands coverage territory and their supported products to reach more customers with our brand of customer service and support.
Nomination Category: Customer Service Awards Department Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Customer Service Department of the Year – Computer Hardware

Nomination Title: Service Express, Inc.

Tell the story about what this nominated department achieved since the beginning of July 2013 (up to 650 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:

Since 1986, Service Express has been delivering on-site hardware maintenance for mission critical servers. We maintain servers and storage uptime for the data centers in hospitals, manufacturing plants, universities, government agencies and other mid- to enterprise-sized companies. With local 28 local offices in 12 states, we deliver our exceptional brand of customer service and technical support. SEI’s continued annual growth includes expanded coverage territory, new supported products and additional employee positions.

Focus, understanding and delivery of customer service is key to SEI’s 98% customer retention rate. To realize this commitment, we start by hiring the people who share our outlook. SEI recruiters follow a deliberate interviewing process to find and hire only top talent with the attitudes and ability that fit with our Four Core Objectives of Excellent Customer Service, Employee Engagement, Margin Retention and Revenue Growth.

We combine a proactive approach to service and delivering solutions and creating long-term partnerships with customers based on mutual respect, trust and loyalty. As of September, our NPS score is 86.7%, with a year to date of 361 respondents.

In contrast to our OEM competitors (IBM, Dell, HP), we provide customers with a simple, straightforward means to get support. Our customer support team provides seamless calls by asking for only relevant information, avoiding endless prompts and meaningless questions. This teams averages over 3,300 service calls a month and our engineers call the customer within 30 minutes – averaging a call back time of less than 10 minutes. Customers have the option to place a service call via phone or an online portal. The portal also gives customer access to their service call history and their agreement(s).

Each customer can count on a primary and secondary engineer to support their equipment. These engineers become familiar with the staff and the business needs of their customer. To be prepared for service issues, SEI has parts that are locally stocked. Resolution is delivered on the first trip for nine of every ten calls and engineers meet the onsite response requirement 99% of the time. To avoid parts delays, our distribution warehouse houses over 65,000 parts and maintains a 99% real-time inventory accuracy.

Customers appreciate flexibility. For changes to an agreement, our billing team makes adjustments at any time, accommodating customer needs. Invoice accuracy is also a plus – we average a 99.84% error-free ratio, with 24 errors of 15,350 billed invoices since July 2013. SEI offers multiple payment options and provides warranty tracking, which means we monitor the expiration dates for our customers at no additional cost.

Technical customer service within SEI includes: a 24/7 IT help desk for employee support, and for engineers and account executives, there is our field technical operations support team to provide a guaranteed 15 minute call back to answer questions. With over 200 support calls logged a month, this team achieved a 97% response rate on their callbacks.

Employee development strengthens the ability to provide the best in customer service. SEI team members participate in quarterly professional development. Focus areas include training for customer service, technical aptitude, professional, leadership and facilitator development. For technical knowledge, we average over 100 student days a month.

SEI achievements include being a repeat winner of the “101 Best and Brightest Companies to Work for in the Nation” including “101 Best and Brightest” for Atlanta, Chicago, Metropolitan Detroit and West Michigan since 2002. SEI was awarded the Michigan’s Top Workplace by the Detroit Free Press and Workplace Dynamics. We have also been named to the Inc. 5000 List of America’s Fastest-Growing Privately Held Companies.

With the right team, attitude, investment and processes, SEI is able to raise the level of customer service and maintenance support and make it easy for a customer to get the support they need.

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