Companies today are dealing with an increasing range of vulnerable customers and should remember that seemingly small changes can have a significant impact.

Against a backdrop of varying policy support and shifting funding commitments, the rise of empowered communities across the UK is even more notable.

It doesn’t seem too long ago that the introduction of interactive voice response (IVR) received a rocky reception with many customers citing that they preferred to speak to a ‘real human’.

There can be no doubt the pandemic has altered the emotional make-up of society. Collectively, we are now much more aware of the suffering of others – and how could we not be after seeing lives turned upside down and businesses upended with no sense of rhyme or reason or equity.

Knowing you’re delighting your customers is the holy grail for any business.

As we’ve mentioned in a previous article, 2021 saw smaller UK energy suppliers cease trading and exit the market at an unprecedented rate.

Energy Day at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) was dominated by the message: ‘consign coal to history’.

The second year of the pandemic has seen more people in the UK slide further into debt and organisations need to recalibrate their response through empathetic collections.

Our previous articles have focused on the life and pensions workplace of the future, identifying new organisational structures, and working patterns that take account of the digital revolution we’re living through. Now we’ll turn our attention to the customer experience itself.

You don’t have to be involved in collections to be aware that the last 18 months have affected the financial circumstances of a huge number of people.