The Better Business Bureau handles an average of 5,500 complaints every month in Los Angeles County alone. They come in all shapes and sizes and not all are from customers; when a business has a legitimate issue, we give it the same attention.

By the time a business comes to us it has usually exhausted most of its options. Most complaints can be resolved with good customer service – courtesy, respect, listening and accepting responsibility.

The Internet is brimming with advice on dealing with customers who attack through social media; however, there’s less advice out there for dealing with seemingly impossible customers who prefer direct confrontation. Placating an unhappy customer is one thing; standing up to an unreasonable customer is another.

If you’re in business long enough, chances are you’ll come face to face with a customer who claims to have damning evidence against you and threatens to take down your business. They attack by phone, letter or even in person. They won’t back down and they refuse to accept that your response was satisfactory, even when all evidence is in your favor.

The majority of these cases arise when a service is performed rather than a product sold. Things get more complicated when a customer can’t simply return a product for a refund.

Doug, a BBB accredited contractor, did a job at Dee’s home and she signed off on the work. It was a shock when Doug got a call three months later from Dee, who demanded half her money back. She said he had overcharged her, but Doug suspected she was trying to recoup money she paid another contractor who had botched a previous job – including damage repaired by Doug’s crew.

Doug approached the Better Business Bureau and we called Dee to see if we could resolve the issue. Despite multiple offers of help, Dee insisted on pursuing her complaint with the Contractors State License Board. Doug offered to go through the BBB’s free arbitration process with her but she refused.

Dee brought two competing estimates to the board hearing, both lower than Doug’s. When asked why she didn’t forward them to Doug, she didn’t have an answer, nor could she explain the dates on the estimates or why she didn’t first take Doug to small claims court. Maybe she falsified the estimates. We’ll never know. Her only reply was Doug ripped her off. The board quickly disagreed and found in Doug’s favor.

Desperate consumers

Sometimes desperate consumers will take a shot and come after a business with an excess of emotion and a scarcity of evidence. There are several lessons for business owners:

• Follow the law and make sure you’re in compliance with industry regulations.
• Document everything. Doug had a completion certificate signed by Dee and copies of letters he wrote her plus email correspondence with the BBB. His evidence outweighed what Dee brought to the hearing.
• Double-check everything you present to a customer – whether it’s an estimate, change order or completion certificate.
• Be transparent. State your policies clearly and accessibly – on your website and in store.
• If it doesn’t feel right, resign the job. You don’t need the aggravation. It’s important, of course, to make that decision early before money changes hands, so it requires careful observation and intuition to know when a relationship will go south.

If you reach an impasse, contact the BBB. We can intervene and suggest several possible solutions.

Finally, hold on to your integrity. Even a seemingly intractable situation doesn’t give you license to resort to anger or aggression. Don’t go in with a defensive posture – the situation will quickly escalate – or react like a ticket agent who makes sure an angry passenger’s bags don’t make it to their destination. Neither is acceptable.

This was the first impossible customer Doug had dealt with in 54 years. He’s had his share of baseless complaints before, but there was always a way to resolve them. The takeaway? The time and money spent trying to fix something – communicating, documenting and responding – sometimes it’s the cost of doing business. It’s a chance to learn something about yourself and an opportunity to shore up some of your policies and procedures.

While impossible customers can’t be avoided, you do have a choice in how you deal with them.

Steve McFarland is chief executive of the Better Business Bureau serving Los Angeles.