Lead an 8D after a customer complaint
Answer a complaint with the eight steps of the 8D: the team, the problem, containment, the cause, the correction, its check, prevention and closure.
The task in figures
- Gives you back
- It does not recur every month
- Elmira today
- Helps
- Frequency
- Per project
- Who does it today
- Senior
- Version
- Elmira Senior
What hurts today.
The deadlines are the customer’s, and the containment is coordinated by phone.
The cause is written to fill in the form, without checking it.
The same complaint comes back with another product.
When a customer complains, the company has to answer fast and with method, often in the format the customer asks for. The 8D orders that answer: a team is formed, the problem is described, it is contained so no more bad product goes out, the root cause is found, corrected, checked, prevented in other products, and the work is closed by recognizing the team. Someone experienced leads it, against the customer’s deadlines, and the report is put together by hand in Word or in the customer’s portal.
Done today with
- Expert
- In-person meeting
- On the floor
- Paper and whiteboard
- Spreadsheet
- Email and chat
- Slides
- Statistics software
- Project tool
Each step, today and with Elmira.
On WhatsApp, Elmira sets down the containment and the corrections as actions with an owner and a date, and tells you how they are going. With the Value Office, the description and the cause go in the Problem playbook; the report is still yours.
| Step | Today | With Elmira |
|---|---|---|
| D1: form the team | In-person meeting, Email and chat | Your call |
| D2: describe the problem as the customer saw it | Paper and whiteboard, Email and chat30 min – 1 h | Comes with the value office |
| D3: hand out the containment, so no more bad product goes out | On the floor, Email and chat15 min – 45 min | |
| D4: find and check the root cause | In-person meeting, Statistics software1 h – 4 h | Comes with the value office |
| D5–D6: choose the correction, put it in place and check it | Spreadsheet, Project tool30 min – 1 h | |
| D7: keep it from happening again in other products and processes | Expert, In-person meeting30 min – 2 h | Still by hand |
| D8: put together the report for the customer and close | Slides, Email and chat1 h – 2 h | Still by hand |
The conversation
- Marta, Quality lead
Elmira, a customer complained about boxes with an open seal, from batch 4521. Luis Araya should check today the boxes of that batch still in the warehouse and set the bad ones aside.
Create the action “Check batch 4521’s boxes in the warehouse”
Goal: Reduce complaints
Team: Production
Responsible: Luis Araya
Due on October 9, 2026
Done when: every box of the batch checked, and the bad ones set aside
- Marta, Quality lead
Approve
Done: I created the action “Check batch 4521’s boxes in the warehouse”.
Does this happen to your team?
Book a demo and we will show you Elmira doing this task.
More cases of problem solving
- Gather the problems people on the floor reportWhat is said in the hallway reaches nobody.
- Spot the problems in the indicators’ deviationsPeople react to every number that drops, and none gets solved.
- Keep the list of open problems and their statusThe list lives apart from the plan, and goes stale.