What does a Customer Service Professional do?
A customer service professional is responsible for providing the highest customer service by responding to the customers' inquiries and concerns, resolving complaints, and updating the customers of goods and services for generating revenues and profitability to the company. Customer service professionals process order transactions, administering payment plans and adjusting service features in meeting customers' needs. A customer service professional should be highly communicative, as well as have excellent time-management skills in documenting customers' information on various software tools to maximize productivity and efficiency.
Customer service professional responsibilities
Here are examples of responsibilities from real customer service professional resumes:
- Manage quality communication, troubleshoot escalate issues; issue refunds, credits and other methods of retention to regain customers trust.
- Manage bi-weekly payroll duties and employment documentation.
- Work with technical support to troubleshoot phone and computer system errors by performing physical/technical on-site resolution procedures.
- Operate POS system to itemize and complete customer purchases, and monitor cash drawers to ensure adequate cash supply.
- Execute all office and systems procedures, including opening, closing, POS, cash drawer reconciliation, and paperwork filing.
- Receive numerous customer appreciation emails for providing solutions for windows operating system issues and other software-relate problems.
- Commend for initiative, enthusiasm, tenacity, persuasiveness, intense customer focus and dependability in performance evaluations.
- Determine Medicaid requirements and eligibility.
Customer service professional skills and personality traits
We calculated that 30% of Customer Service Professionals are proficient in Customer Service, Inbound Calls, and Strong Customer Service. They’re also known for soft skills such as Communication skills, Computer skills, and Customer-service skills.
We break down the percentage of Customer Service Professionals that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- Customer Service, 30%
Provide exceptional customer service while problem solving and providing solutions by responding to incoming calls from customers with personal account inquiries.
- Inbound Calls, 6%
Assisted policyholders and their financial professionals via inbound calls with inquiries regarding their individual life policies.
- Strong Customer Service, 6%
Used strong customer service skills and demonstrated a balance of sensitivity to customers along with maintaining accuracy and production standards.
- Annuities, 4%
Assist customers in looking over their annuities by providing policy information and updating basic information if needed.
- Schedule Appointments, 3%
Scheduled appointments and confirming appointments and reschedule appointments.
- Troubleshoot, 3%
Worked with technical support to troubleshoot phone and computer system errors by performing physical/technical on-site resolution procedures.
"customer service," "inbound calls," and "strong customer service" are among the most common skills that customer service professionals use at work. You can find even more customer service professional responsibilities below, including:
Communication skills. To carry out their duties, the most important skill for a customer service professional to have is communication skills. Their role and responsibilities require that "customer service representatives must be able to provide clear information in writing, by phone, or in person." Customer service professionals often use communication skills in their day-to-day job, as shown by this real resume: "increase customer retention rate skills used effective communication computer and technical literacy problem-solving/creativity teamwork adaptability and flexibility detail oriented customer care"
Customer-service skills. This is an important skill for customer service professionals to perform their duties. For an example of how customer service professional responsibilities depend on this skill, consider that "representatives help companies retain customers by professionally answering questions and helping to resolve complaints." This excerpt from a resume also shows how vital it is to everyday roles and responsibilities of a customer service professional: "canvased various inner city and rural locations, delivered professional customer service in accordance with federal operating standards. ".
Interpersonal skills. A big part of what customer service professionals do relies on "interpersonal skills." You can see how essential it is to customer service professional responsibilities because "representatives should be able to create positive interactions with customers." Here's an example of how this skill is used from a resume that represents typical customer service professional tasks: "leveraged strong interpersonal skills and product knowledge to execute daily customer support. "
Listening skills. A commonly-found skill in customer service professional job descriptions, "listening skills" is essential to what customer service professionals do. Customer service professional responsibilities rely on this skill because "representatives must listen carefully to ensure that they understand customers in order to assist them." You can also see how customer service professional duties rely on listening skills in this resume example: "maintained daily reports, communicated with clients for payment arrangements and debt resolution. "
Patience. Another skill commonly found on customer service professional job descriptions is "patience." It can come up quite often in customer service professional duties, since "representatives should be patient and polite, especially when interacting with dissatisfied customers." Here's an example from a resume of how this skill fits into day-to-day customer service professional responsibilities: "demonstrate excellent call handling skill, patience and respect. "
The three companies that hire the most customer service professionals are:
- Splunk20 customer service professionals jobs
- Empower Retirement19 customer service professionals jobs
- New York Life Insurance16 customer service professionals jobs
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Compare different customer service professionals
Customer service professional vs. Customer relations representative
A customer relations representative is responsible for providing the highest customer service by interacting with customers to respond to their inquiries and concerns, process their requests, and resolve their complaints. Customer relations representatives assist the customers with their needs by offering products and services according to their requirements and budget limitations. They may also sell newly launched products to the customers, discuss features and usability, and generate payments and delivery details. A customer relations representative must have excellent communication and organizational skills to maintain healthy business relationships with the customers to achieve the company's long-term goals and objectives.
These skill sets are where the common ground ends though. The responsibilities of a customer service professional are more likely to require skills like "strong computer," "strong customer service," "annuities," and "troubleshoot." On the other hand, a job as a customer relations representative requires skills like "customer relations," "team-oriented environment," "propane," and "customer retention." As you can see, what employees do in each career varies considerably.
Customer relations representatives tend to reach similar levels of education than customer service professionals. In fact, customer relations representatives are 0.2% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 0.0% more likely to have a Doctoral Degree.Customer service professional vs. Service agent
A service agent is an individual whose primary function is to provide a friendly service to internal and external customers about the organization's products and services. An agent should be people-oriented, highly motivated with a positive and friendly attitude. Although an agent usually works in a call center, an agent can communicate in various ways, such as the telephone or often face to face. The minimum educational requirement of being a service agent is a high school diploma; however, the customer service experience is a plus.
While some skills are similar in these professions, other skills aren't so similar. For example, resumes show us that customer service professional responsibilities requires skills like "strong computer," "strong customer service," "annuities," and "schedule appointments." But a service agent might use other skills in their typical duties, such as, "regular maintenance," "credit card," "pet," and "car washes."
Average education levels between the two professions vary. Service agents tend to reach similar levels of education than customer service professionals. In fact, they're 1.7% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 0.0% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Customer service professional vs. Customer agent
A customer agent provides friendly service to external and internal customers. Customer agents talk to customers on behalf of businesses and companies. They help customers with their queries and complaints. It is their job to give customers a better understanding of the products. They answer questions with regards to their reservations. Sometimes, they also have sales roles. Oftentimes, they answer questions, process sales, provide information, and resolve problems.
Some important key differences between the two careers include a few of the skills necessary to fulfill the responsibilities of each. Some examples from customer service professional resumes include skills like "strong computer," "inbound calls," "strong customer service," and "annuities," whereas a customer agent is more likely to list skills in "data entry," "customer satisfaction," "customer inquiries," and "inbound phone calls. "
Customer agents typically earn similar educational levels compared to customer service professionals. Specifically, they're 0.4% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree, and 0.1% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Customer service professional vs. Customer relations specialist
A customer relations specialist is responsible for providing high-quality services for customers by responding to their inquiries and concerns and resolving complaints about the company's goods and services. Customer relations specialists update customer accounts on the database, recording their transactions accurately, and posting their payments timely. They may also sell new products and services to the clients, demonstrating features and usability, processing orders, and confirming delivery details. A customer relations specialist must have excellent communication and organizational skills to ensure customer satisfaction and maintain healthy business relationships with the customers.
Even though a few skill sets overlap between customer service professionals and customer relations specialists, there are some differences that are important to note. For one, a customer service professional might have more use for skills like "strong computer," "inbound calls," "annuities," and "troubleshoot." Meanwhile, some responsibilities of customer relations specialists require skills like "customer relations," "data entry," "work ethic," and "strong work ethic. "
In general, customer relations specialists hold similar degree levels compared to customer service professionals. Customer relations specialists are 1.4% more likely to earn their Master's Degree and 0.0% more likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.Types of customer service professional
Updated January 8, 2025
