Should we be giving “that difficult client" a break?

We all have “that” client. You know, the one that you see booked for a consult in your column and your groan a little inside. The one who asks a million questions before leaving the room? The one who demands you fix their pet for free each time they come? The one who always brings in two pets when she books for one? The one who’s always late? Or the genuinely difficult rude one?

Our first instinct is to get frustrated with them. Don’t they know that they were only booked for a 20 minute consultation and they have now been in your room for 40? Can’t they understand that when they come 15 minutes late for an appointment, they have actually missed three quarters of it. It puts us behind for the rest of our morning and turns what would have been a pleasant day into a rather stressful one. It’s so much easier to assume the worst of these people than to consider that maybe they have a genuine reason for why they were late.

Last week we had a dog that arrived an hour late for an appointment. Our first instinct is always to get angry. How could they be so late for their appointment? The truth was the owner of this particular 60kg pet was physically disabled, add to this the difficulty that the pet was so sick that it was unable to walk and the man had to call a friend to come over and help him get his beloved friend into the car. Suddenly we have a lot more sympathy for the man and some understanding as to why he might be so late.

In life it can be easier to see the negatives than the positives. Easier to complain than to see the silver linings of a scenario. We need to remember that sometimes it’s ok to give people the benefit of the doubt. They may have something going on in their lives which is more than we can understand. That client who asks a million questions and drives you behind is likely doing it because she loves her pet and wants what is best for her fur-child.

Unfortunately, some clients are just that difficult, and those ones do test us. But most are pretty lovely and just wanting your help at a stressful time.