The Art of Client Service

Chapter 45No Surprises about Money or Time

After I took over running a major account at one of the agencies I worked for, I discovered the agency had, during a period of seven months, exceeded the agreed-on fee budget by nearly $1 million. Yes, that's right: One million dollars.

The client/agency relationship had been rocky, and the previous leadership on the account chose not to disclose the fee overrun to the client, fearing it would jeopardize the account.

I inherited this problem knowing that a cardinal rule of account service is to never surprise your clients about a cost overrun or a scheduling delay. But I had the advantage of being the new guy on the account. I investigated the cost overrun. It appeared that roughly half of it was due to agency inefficiency, the other half due to excessive client changes and unbudgeted additional assignments.

When the client made revisions to the work and added assignments, the agency, of course, should have adjusted its budgets and secured client approval for higher fees. The agency, fearing for the future of the account, failed to do this. Over time, as the problem grew larger and larger, it became increasingly difficult to address. Rather than bringing up the issue with the client, the account team ignored it. When the agency's accounting department pressed the account team to speak with the client, the account people responded, “If we do, we'll lose the account!”

I told my management that I was going to settle the issue without delay. ...