Syllabus for APS-302

CUSTOMER SERVICE: A PRACTICAL APPROACH  


COURSE DESCRIPTION

Customer Service: A Practical Approach presents the principal concepts and current trends in the customer service industryParticular areas of concentration involve defining customer service and identifying its challenges, employing the problem-solving process, formulating a customer service strategy, coping with challenging customers, retaining customers, and measuring performance. Students will analyze the significant elements of customer service and apply effective customer service principles. 

COURSE OBJECTIVES

After completing this course, you should be able to:

  1. Explain and discuss customer service.
  2. Analyze common barriers to effective customer service.
  3. Apply the problem-solving process to providing customer service.
  4. Devise an effective customer service strategy, including methods for empowering customer service providers.
  5. Discuss the importance of effective communication in customer service. 
  6. Analyze methods for coping with challenging customers.
  7. Discuss the importance of motivation and leadership in customer service.
  8. Connect customer retention and the measurement of customer satisfaction.
  9. Compare and contrast ways of serving customers using traditional and technological methods.
  10. Explain the rewards of providing excellent customer service.

COURSE MATERIALS

You will need the following materials to complete your coursework. Some course materials may be free, open source, or available from other providers. You can access free or open-source materials by clicking the links provided below or in the module details documents. To purchase course materials, please visit the University's textbook supplier.

Required Textbook

  • Harris, E. K. (2010). Customer service: A practical approach, (5th ed.).  New Jersey: Pearson/Prentice Hall.
    ISBN-13: 978-0135064337

COURSE STRUCTURE

Customer Service: A Practical Approach is a three-credit online course, consisting of six (6) modules. Modules include an overview, topics, learning objectives, study materials, and activities. Module titles are listed below.

ASSESSMENT METHODS

For your formal work in the course, you are required to participate in online discussion forums, complete written assignments, take six online quizzes and a proctored online midterm examination, and complete a final project. See below for more details.

Consult the Course Calendar for assignment due dates.

Promoting Originality

One or more of your course activities may utilize a tool designed to promote original work and evaluate your submissions for plagiarism. More information about this tool is available in this document.

Discussion Forums

You are required to participate in six graded discussion forums as well as an ungraded Introductions Forum. The online discussions are on a variety of topics associated with the course modules.

Located within the Evaluation Rubrics folder of  the course Web site is the online discussion forum rubric used to aid in the grading of all online discussions.

Written Assignments

You are required to complete six written assignments. The written assignments are on a variety of topics associated with the module learning objectives. In all of these assignments, you should make reference to readings and other sources of information as appropriate, and document these references in proper format.

Located within the Evaluation Rubrics folder of  the course Web site is the written assignment rubric used to aid in the grading of all written activities.

Quizzes

You are required to complete six quizzes on course objectives and topics. These are timed and graded quizzes.

Midterm Examination

You are required to take a proctored online midterm examination.

For the midterm, you are required to use the University's Online Proctor Service (OPS). Please refer to the "Examinations and Proctors" section of the Online Student Handbook (see General Information area of the course Web site) for further information about scheduling and taking online exams and for all exam policies and procedures. You are strongly advised to schedule your exam within the first week of the semester.

The midterm is a closed-book, proctored online exam. It is two hours long and covers all reading and assignments through Module 3 of the course (textbook Chapters 1 through 7). It consists of five essay questions. 

Exams are administered in the Examinations section of the course Web site. Consult the course Calendar for the official dates of your midterm exam week.

Statement about Cheating

You are on your honor not to cheat during an exam. Cheating means:

If there is evidence that you have cheated or plagiarized in an exam, the exam will be declared invalid, and you will fail the course.

Final Project

Your final project involves applying the customer service concepts and practices covered in this course to a real-world organization. The Final Project section of the course site explains the project in more detail.

The firm you choose must, however, be one that is in your area of concentration. Confer with your mentor before getting started in order to check the appropriateness of your choice.

Located within the Evaluation Rubrics folder of the course Web site is the final project rubric used to aid in the grading of the final project.


GRADING AND EVALUATION

Your grade in the course will be determined as follows:

All activities will receive a numerical grade of 0–100. You will receive a score of 0 for any work not submitted. Your final grade in the course will be a letter grade. Letter grade equivalents for numerical grades are as follows:

A

=

93–100

C+

=

78–79

A–

=

90–92

C

=

73–77

B+

=

88–89

C–

=

70–72

B

=

83–87

D

=

60–69

B–

=

80–82

F

=

Below 60

To receive credit for the course, you must earn a letter grade of C or better (for an area of study course) or D or better (for a course not in your area of study), based on the weighted average of all assigned course work (e.g., exams, assignments, discussion postings, etc.).

STRATEGIES FOR SUCCESS

First Steps to Success

To succeed in this course, take the following first steps:


Study Tips

Consider the following study tip for success:

To stay on track throughout the course, begin each week by consulting the Course Calendar. The calendar provides an overview of the course and indicates due dates for submitting assignments, posting discussions, and scheduling and taking examinations.

ACADEMIC POLICIES

To ensure success in all your academic endeavors and coursework at Thomas Edison State University, familiarize yourself with all administrative and academic policies including those related to academic integrity, course late submissions, course extensions, and grading policies.

For more, see:

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