CBL Episode # 108-The Booking Koala Meltdown: Lessons in Crisis Management and Customer Care

What happens when the software platform running your entire business suddenly crashes and stays down for weeks? For cleaning business owners using Booking Koala, this nightmare scenario became reality in what can only be described as a customer service catastrophe.

We pull back the curtain on this ongoing crisis that has left service-based businesses unable to book clients, process payments, or maintain their websites for over two weeks. The true failure, however, isn't just technical – it's the stunning lack of communication, empathy, and accountability from the company during a critical moment.

The conversation goes beyond just critiquing one platform's mistakes. We explore essential business survival skills including having contingency plans, knowing how to "pivot" when systems fail, and maintaining old-school backup methods that don't rely on technology. Many businesses found themselves completely paralyzed because they had no alternative systems in place – a dangerous vulnerability in our technology-dependent world.

Customer service emerges as the real differentiator between businesses that thrive and those that collapse under pressure. We discuss practical approaches to handling customer complaints, the importance of taking ownership even when problems aren't directly your fault, and why accessibility (yes, having an actual phone number people can call!) still matters tremendously.

This episode serves as both a cautionary tale and a masterclass in crisis management. Whether you're running a cleaning business, a software company, or any service-oriented enterprise, these lessons in transparent communication and customer-first problem solving can mean the difference between weathering a storm or becoming another business failure statistic.

Listen now to ensure your business never falls into these devastating customer service traps!

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Chapters

• 1:48 Welcome and Introduction
• 2:52 The Booking Koala Crisis Explained
• 5:56 Importance of Taking Ownership
• 12:24 Pivoting When Systems Fail
• 17:14 Quality Customer Service Matters
• 24:05 Having Contingency Plans
• 27:20 Proper Responses to Customer Complaints
• 30:44 Final Thoughts on Customer Service

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:56

welcome back, all right. The stuff that we say to each other right before we go live is always interesting yellow leather. Red leather, yellow leather baby buggy bumper, baby seashells on the seashore. Okay, I used to actually live next to an opera singer when I lived in Long Beach and every afternoon she was a professional opera singer and you could hear her like, oh yeah, and she would actually do it over the pool, because she built a pool in her teeny tiny backyard and that waterway the way it would carry across the water.

Speaker 1: 1:37

So oh yeah on the other side. I didn't get it, but I happened to be over at the neighbor's house having a barbecue and I'm like, oh my god, this is awesome because I love it traveled across. That is that's awesome. People are gonna do for a living. But opera singing was her. Yeah, no kidding.

Speaker 2: 1:58

I like that.

Speaker 1: 2:00

Today we are going to talk about the lack of customer service We've witnessed. If you've participated with us, we have, we have witnessed, I believe. I don't know if they'll be able to recover. They've had this is a metaphor They've had a heart attack on the operating table and I don't know if they can. What are those things? Ekg, where they zap the body to kind of get the thing going again? What is that called?

Speaker 2: 2:28

A defibrillator or something like that.

Speaker 1: 2:29

Yeah, I think it's an EKG and they say hands off, hands off. And then they zap it and and then they zap them into every like medical drama out there. Everybody has the zapping scene with the defibrillator.

Speaker 2: 2:42

They rub them together, you know and what's really horrible and we're okay. So what we're talking about here is obviously booking. Koala has, which is a booking. Obviously it's a booking platform. I was with them for a little while, maybe a week.

Speaker 1: 2:58

Service-based businesses. So we're not.

Speaker 2: 3:00

it's not just cleaners, Mostly cleaners, but not just cleaners, but there's a lot, and so I ended up staying in the group, because I network with a lot of these people anyway, I'm in there too.

Speaker 1: 3:12

I'm contemplated.

Speaker 2: 3:15

Yeah, you have Right before this all happened. But now it's kind of like we're sitting back like whoa and watching. It's like date-based soap opera. Yeah, it's just we're getting the popcorn because the lack of customer service, of customer service and what that can do, to not only look what it's doing to their business but it can also do it to your business. If you don't get to this in a timely fashion and take your own ownership, not blaming others, others yeah, take your own ownership and have policy, have stuff in place so that this does not happen. And this is obviously. Obviously there's nothing in place for. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 4:12

There's nothing in place for a crisis and there's nothing in place for customer service. It's people want, they don't want to be treated with indifference and I know this is the mentality of a lot of our society right now is that it's. They just want the money and they don't want to do anything after the transaction's over. They just they're trying to make our industry into a fast food restaurant business model and it's just not the case. When you're providing a service which booking koala is technically a service, it's a product but you're paying for service. And, by the way, GetJobber has done an excellent. They've grown.

Speaker 1: 4:51

But there was a couple of bumps in the road We've. You know that was a long, long time ago and they owned it and said, yeah, oh my gosh, I gotta fix this. But with fucking koala it was just the blatant silence that they had in the sand. It was the indifference that they were treated with when they brought things to their attention and it was the lack of communication and not knowing there was an end. And I get, sometimes things happen. But to blame a competitor, to blame a contract, Whether it's true or not, Whether it was true or not but to come out, nobody cares about those guys. They only care whether you're going to fix their problem. And if you're not listening to your customers, if you're not apologizing and you're not acknowledging we're watching, I'm hoping them to be able to resuscitate, but it could happen that they just this could be the end of them, just by having treated so many people wrong, and not just in this country.

Speaker 2: 5:50

They have international customers too, and my heart has gone at the this. You got to understand a lot of these people that are cleaners, that own cleaning companies in that use booking. They're my very good friends. Um, and it just.

Speaker 1: 6:08

I've had private conversations and I'm like I don't know, I don't know I don't work for them. I don't know, I don't know.

Speaker 2: 6:13

Yeah yeah, it was just yeah. Yeah, it was just yeah. It made for a busy week for us, because a lot of people came in and just was scared and just did not know what was going to happen and how do we help them through this. And it's just, we don't work for booking koala.

Speaker 1: 6:39

We did have the conversation earlier in the week because we discussed this all week long and some of the best advice I've gotten from a mentor that I paid thousands of dollars to was being able, when the shit goes down I know I've cursed in three episodes in a row. Now, when it goes down, you as a business owner need to look at the whole structure of what has happened and you need to pivot. That is the imminent danger. I could, my business could fail. We've watched I don't know how many cleaning business owners not know what to do. And it goes back to what I've mentioned before.

Speaker 1: 7:15

When the cash register goes down, nobody knows how to count cash. When your systems don't work, you have to old school it or pivot in a different direction with other software. But there was no offering from Booking Koala to try to say, hey, you can do it this way until we get this fixed. Their websites weren't working. It's now been two weeks. These people have not had websites. They're not able to book, they're not able to take payments, but you can still persevere and you could.

Speaker 1: 7:46

Yes, is it labor intensive? Yes, is it inconvenience? Yes, yes, but you're actually going to have to drive a lot longer, right. So I don't know what's going to happen to some of these cleaning business owners. I'm hoping they're able to recover and they've learned from this experience. But you have to be able to pivot.

Speaker 1: 8:05

And it was a story about, um, I'm not going to name the person of this mentor, but it was a story about when the economy went bad and when she actually was her mentor who explained to her that she needed a pivot. She didn't see the water under the bridge because she was too busy with her hands trying to put out the fire, and it was that person who told her like he said hey, you gotta pivot. If you don't pivot, you're gonna sink, and it happens. So if things are not running smoothly because the cleaning business is all about systems you need to have. The two most important are your cleaning techs acquiring cleaning techs and picking up clients. Everything else is a system as well, but those are your two biggies. If you can't do one or the other, then you have to look at your system and figure out what's broken so that you can compensate for that until they either a fix the software or you move on to a different software. Um, I think a lot of people picked booking koala because of price.

Speaker 2: 9:05

Um, we see that in the cleaning industry they pick other cleaners for price and stuff like this happens all right, yep, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's why I did, but whenever I start and this is my own experience I just it was too complicated for me to basically put together my whole system.

Speaker 1: 9:28

You shouldn't need a specialist to have software added into your website.

Speaker 2: 9:32

I have other. I'm not that person, that's not, that's not my forte. I'm good at, uh, gaining clients. I, I'm good at sales, um, but uh. So I went another route. I went with jobber Um and I I I'm sure I went to made Lee. I, I did uh, launched I've read them all launched 27. I've done them all and I left Jabra for a second, sorry, and I was like, no, this isn't for me. So I came back. Their customer service is, for me, top notch and that's what kept me there. I, I can overlook the price. I, I, I, I doing business, it is and I it's. It has made my life so much easier because all of it is just with the click of a button. Yes, it's a little bit more. I think the bottom tier is a little over a hundred and a hundred bucks 120 now, I believe. But once you see that and get your foot in that door and see the amount that it can help, you with.

Speaker 1: 10:48

it's okay. Yeah, it's the beginner step for an automation process for you down in the future Right after a bookkeeper, you should have a platform that has some sort of calendar system. Don't old school it like I used to and have to call you know at the end of the day after you've done all of these other things. So Booking Koala missed the mark on it. They didn't provide any customer service. They didn't offer any acknowledgement. They argued with people on their Facebook page and said not nice things.

Speaker 2: 11:21

I was like ouch your customer and clearly these customers were freaking out and you know this is. You know, if jobber went down, yep, my cleaning techs would I. You know, I have stuff written down. It's not gone completely. There is still a system.

Speaker 1: 11:48

There's still something in place for me to be able to figure it out Some of these guys panicked and they're like I operate in four States and I could understand the schedule that big, but there should be some backup protocol that you have that you could, more than likely, if you have regular recurring clients, can figure out. Okay, mrs Smith is here. Mr Mnuna is over here you know where am I missing? And then you could start to Rolodex through where you're missing and you should put out a notice, an email notice, even if your CRM is booking quality I don't know if it has a CRM or not you should have a backup system where you can load in all those people and, worst case scenario, if you haven't done that piece yet, you could post on your Facebook page. You could go to your website, if it's up, and post it there.

Speaker 1: 12:32

Hey, we're having technical problems. I'm happy to answer the phone. Here is my number. Everybody in America has my phone number. I went to a cleaning business owners Facebook page no phone number listed whatsoever. I could not get ahold of this person. Very frustrating. Everybody has my number. I'm not afraid for anyone to have my number. I don't mind talking on the phone. It does not bother me. When I don't talk on the phone, someone else answers the phone for me.

Speaker 2: 12:58

I know, and I hear a lot of people or not a lot. I hear some people. Oh, I'm really just an introvert and really shy.

Speaker 1: 13:06

I you in a human industry.

Speaker 2: 13:08

I have to try and break through that mold um right you know, at the end of the day, we're chasing the money, and if you want the money that comes with this, you are going to have to become somewhat of an extrovert and talk on the phone. As being one of them and acknowledging that.

Speaker 1: 13:33

Own it. Oh, we got hacked by a competitor. I'm like I can't believe.

Speaker 2: 13:35

they just said that I could not either I, just what Really Just put the blame on somebody else.

Speaker 1: 13:42

This is why this happened.

Speaker 2: 13:45

If it's true, let it be. Just say, hey, we're having difficulties, we're trying as fast as we can and keep up on it. Have somebody. Obviously there's not very many people working behind the scenes there, because I feel like this is what the show is all about is customer service, and the customer service is super lacking in that area. I think maybe only two or three people work the behind the scenes. I don't know they could have easily hired on a va.

Speaker 1: 14:23

I need you to man the phones, I need you to be on customers. I mean, if and if you don't have you over here, bucks would have been like way easier than dealing with all the damage control that they're caught. They're indirectly shooting themselves in their own feet by saying what they're saying because, because they're not empathetic, they don't seem concerned, there is no sense of urgency, and they could have told us all the juicy dirt at the end with an email oh my gosh, this is what happened. Thank you so much for sticking by me. I'm really sorry. Here is a credit. And, by the way, we were hacked by a competitor blanket statement. They didn't have to come out and keep bringing up. Well, we were hacked, we were hacked, we were hacked. Nobody cares, they just want you to fix their problem. They're not able to earn income.

Speaker 2: 15:05

I just I posted a couple of times in there and I had some, some person I won't call you out because asked me well, why are you in this group If you're not a part of booking Koala? And I told him I was. A lot of these people are my friends. I built relationships along the way and they PM me. I just you know. So there was a lot of people that were frustrated and mad and just just it was such a.

Speaker 1: 15:38

It's still going on right now it's two weeks in and it still hasn't been fixed. And I'm just nothing.

Speaker 2: 15:46

nothing. There's no timeliness, there's very little empathy. There's no empathy, there's no clear communication with thee. They no clear communication. Um, the professionalism of this whole situation has me just, and I'm sure, left a a really bad taste in people's mouths that have just signed on just signed on with them. It just breaks my heart.

Speaker 1: 16:19

There's room for improvement. If Booking Koala ever listens to this podcast, you put yourself in here. I'm not. This is like watching daytime soap opera. You could stop watching daytime soap opera, pick it up six months down the road and it's still continuing on because the beat goes on. So I'm hoping you guys can pull it out. I'm hoping that you guys are rectifying whatever customer service issue you have. Maybe you hire a VA, maybe you train yourselves to be customer service experts, but I was shocked that a provider I believe booking Koala is right around the jobber price per month. And so if you have hundreds I know hundreds of people in that group, and I know you know hundreds of people in that group it's when you have.

Speaker 1: 16:59

It's not just take the money and run. There has to be some sort of progress in place, like for us. We all know that with one-time cleanings, you usually get a phone call hey, how was your cleaning? Right, yeah? If you're not doing the phone call, then you're leaving yourself open. For I found a hair in the tub. I can't believe you guys left it. Whereas if you call and they say oh, you know, there was a hair left the tub, oh my gosh, let me come back Right. Yeah, that you're. You're getting that opportunity to fix it right there I talk about we talked the other day about you know what happens when the cleaning tech is off for the week and the cleaning business owner struggled on what to do.

Speaker 1: 17:36

So we kind of laid the groundwork for that. But with these guys I don't know if it can be saved. I hope that it can. I hope that they learn from this experience and that they provide customer service going forward. It's clear they need to hire in somebody if they can't do it. That's what we do. We delegate to accountants, bookkeepers, web people, vas for social media, vas for this, vas for that. We do a lot of those things that we only focus on the tasks that are making us money.

Speaker 1: 18:08

You can't make money if your product doesn't work, so being sympathetic, apologizing, owning it. I can't tell you how many times we have seen, especially with large corporations, how many times have we seen blenders with United Airlines where the flight attendants have gone way over the top and made people do stupid things because they were angry at whatever, and the corporation has to come out and apologize. Mike, you can't punch On national TV. Yeah, it's on national TV. You can't punch customers and expect it not to be filmed. You can't tell little kids to take off their ventilators because they obviously need them. You can't tell people that you can't go to the bathroom because you're having a diabetic episode.

Speaker 1: 18:50

These are I'm laughing because it's so utterly ridiculous. There has to be some sort of empathetic equation quotient that you have that you understand. So you're not teaching United Airlines, is not teaching their employees who work for them how to deal with customer service. Now I'm not talking the extreme other things where I've secretly told you to tell someone to screw off because they're just you know they're not going to be a good customer to anybody. I'm talking about genuine people who want to do business with you, are expecting a certain amount of decorum and they're expecting customer service. If you make a mistake, even if you have 1099s and I've had this happen I'm not going to name you. If you have a 1099 that breaks something, you, as the business owner, need to own it. Don't blame it on the 1099.

Speaker 2: 20:18

It's your fault, it's your. You are the business owner. Yeah, well, um, I had a shot glass shower door. You know, I, I, I, I had to pay for that. I, I, oh, it wasn't me that cleaned it. And you didn't hear me say, oh well, it wasn't me, oh, it was such and such, let me go ahead. I, you know, I owned it. If there's hair in the bathtub, I don't say, oh, that's such and such, she does it all the time I own it, and then, I'm sorry, I'll be right over there to the time, yeah, I own it, and then, I'm sorry, I'll be right over there to fix that.

Speaker 1: 20:54

Accountability.

Speaker 2: 20:58

Over there, whom I trained and developed them To understand how to do customer service. They go over there and clean it If they're in the area, so we own it. There's no? Oh yeah, what's her name, right?

Speaker 1: 21:20

And this happens a lot with software companies as well. The thing I love about GetJobber is there's still an 800 number to call the old fashioned way, right.

Speaker 1: 21:31

If you can't get hold of it one way and the chat bot's not working and they will actually. Customer service after the AI kicks in. Their customer service is really easy to navigate. You don't have to use foreign words or other vocabulary words. It's boom, boom, boom With booking Koala, I believe. You land on their page. There is no phone number there, there is no chat bot. There is nothing on this thing. I'm like what is going on?

Speaker 2: 21:54

I don't know of anybody and let me tell you I also see on LinkedIn, um, all the time jobber is they do such a good job at hiring for specific parts, you know, and it could be remote, but you're getting a hold of a live person and they develop so much into training and developing their staff for different areas. I never see booking Koala on LinkedIn. So it's uh, that's just food for thought. Um, there, uh, kind of take that with the like hmm, yeah, maybe she's right, let me look, let me look into this a little more, so investigate that. But yeah, uh, this was just and it, like I said, it's still going. These people are dropping like flies and some of these companies were multi-million dollar companies running off of one platform and they just they didn't know how to. One person said that they couldn't onboard some new hires. I'm surprised that someone who does multi-million dollars has no backup plan that they couldn't onboard some new hires.

Speaker 1: 23:11

I'm surprised that someone who does multi-million dollars has no backup plan, no contingency plan whatsoever. You can't look at your phone for everything. You have to have real world experience to be able to facilitate making a decision. Again, I go back to counting cash. How many people let me get this out of here do not know how to count cash? It's so frustrating. Remove. Sorry, we had to. Don't report. The AI showed up on the thing it popped in.

Speaker 2: 23:40

Right.

Speaker 1: 23:41

But seriously, yeah. So yeah, there has to be a contingency plan. I hope the people who were affected by this booking koala blip have a, a backup plan and and learn how to do stuff. The old school method just because we have technology doesn't always make it convenient. Just because we have technology doesn't mean that we don't have to talk to humans just because we have technology the the technology part. The thing I love the most about technology is the, the steps to automation, because I've been doing this 15 years and I remember having to handwrite in a calendar and I also remember having to physically call somebody. So I have experience because I've been doing this a long time. But you should, if you run a large operation like that, you should be able to roll a dex in your mind and try to figure out how can I still have my business happen right, not panic going, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. It's just like it's frustrating.

Speaker 2: 24:38

It's frustrating for everyone it is um and you know I some people in in that group got a little angry at me for um, I don't know. I bet my heart. It's not geared towards you guys, it's geared to the lack of customer service that booking koala presented to you the the consumer right. This has nothing to do. I understand the frustration and my heart just really goes out to a lot of these people and their businesses.

Speaker 1: 25:13

Don't um me too, and booking koala. If you guys are listening, you deserve this.

Speaker 1: 25:18

This is a spanking, this is a time for mishandling your I almost wanted to cry for these people, and you guys just did not do anything to help ease their mind, except put your head in the sand and blame your competitor, and that's a no so, as a cleaning business owner and I'm gonna say this again, I'll probably say it until I'm blue in the face you, if you provide any sort of customer service, it puts you ahead of the thousands of others in the industry who are not providing any customer service. Someone needs to be able to get a hold of you. You need to have your phone number on your website. You need to have your phone number on your Facebook page. You need to have your phone number on your LinkedIn and if you don't want people calling you, get a second phone. Your mom can have the new number. Your mom's going to know how to get a hold of you your husband or whoever.

Speaker 1: 26:14

So you have to provide some sort of customer service. You've heard me mention before how I worked at Nordy's, and it was legitimately. The employee handbook was a large postcard and the front of it said welcome to Nordstrom's. On the back it said you make your best decisions and that's it. So you had to do everything you could to make the right decision to make the customer happy.

Speaker 1: 26:37

I'm not saying give away the house Things happen. And I'm saying about the people who's trying, the people who are trying to take advantage of your insurance for fraud. I've seen a lot of that. We're going to have to talk about that at some point too. I'm talking about just general customers. Thank you so much for bringing that to my attention and not slamming me all over Facebook. You don't have to say art, but that's what's going on in your head when you're like thanks for bringing this to my attention. Exactly, acknowledge it. Okay, we blundered it. What can I do to? You know, don't ask the customer what can I do to fix it Say, oh, my gosh, I'll be right back, or how about $50?

Speaker 2: 27:16

or a free oven cleaning. How about one?

Speaker 1: 27:18

at something that'll be a value that they can use later. Don't say what would you like me to do about it. You have no idea.

Speaker 2: 27:27

Right, right, right.

Speaker 1: 27:28

Don't, don't put it off on um the client ever, ever because if you give them the opportunity, they will ask for the moon and back. They'll say I want a full refund. I've had people who were not pleased because you dropped service, because you weren't a good fit, and then want to refund on the deep clean. I'm like well, was there a problem with the deep clean?

Speaker 2: 27:48

no, I just want a refund you were perfectly happy, but now that you're not getting your way, there's a time and a place. Whenever you offer them things, them sort of things, and um, man, if it's, if it's really bad like this, I I would um offer booking Koala.

Speaker 2: 28:13

Right, we're going to hopefully not have to have another popcorn week All right, it's already starting Right, but we'll see what happens and we'll keep you guys informed. But that is what you know. Take this this goes for inside of your own company as well. Customer services is just something that you absolutely have to have in order to have a great name out there and have people continuously coming to you because you have excellent customer service.

Speaker 1: 28:53

It's part of your brand. Yeah, I want the cleaning company that doesn't fix anything that goes wrong.

Speaker 2: 28:59

They even give awards out here for this Excellent customer service. Listener's choice, or whatever it's called, but I've seen it. Listener's choice, or whatever it's called, but I've seen it, you know. So, um, I guess I, you know, I guess you get awards now for customer service, but this should just be. That's because there is none. I just uh if you're going to have a company, uh, and you want a great brand, this is all a part of it and part of the customer experience and then booking koala fail, they get a big f yeah, yeah, they did so that's our two cents, right, um?

Speaker 1: 29:43

thanks for tuning in. We'll see you guys next time yeah, we will.