7 local businesses honored for their customer service

Call them the Magnificent Seven.

Seven Colorado Springs-area businesses were honored Thursday as recipients of the 14th annual Excellence in Customer Service Awards, given by the Better Business Bureau of Southern Colorado during a dinner at the Crowne Plaza Hotel on the city's south side.

The BBB's program is designed to help businesses improve customer service practices, increase customer satisfaction and build better customer relationships.

Area businesses, which aren't required to be BBB members, submit applications and must document the extent, quality and effectiveness of their customer service practices.
Applicants receive personalized, professional assessments of their customer service practices; a panel of independent evaluators, sponsored by the Pikes Peak chapter of the American Society for Quality, reviews the applications.

This year's winners were:

• Active Living Home Care: The nonmedical home care agency helps clients live safely in their homes; it serves the elderly and disabled in independent homes, retirement communities and assisted-living facilities.

• Gutter Helmet Southern Colorado: A local franchise of the national Gutter Helmet company that protects and replaces residential gutters.

• Luisa Graff Jewelers: A local jewelry company that markets, repairs and appraises fine jewelry.

• Peak Basement Systems: The construction company's work includes foundations, basements and crawlspaces.

• Pioneer Services: The financial division of MidCountry Bank offers personal, unsecured loans to members of the military and recently retired personnel. Pioneer Services also was an award recipient in 2007.

• Freedom Financial Services: The mortgage company helps homeowners buy, refinance and consolidate their debt.

• Silver Key Senior Services: The nonprofit organization services older adults in the community; its programs include independent living, transportation and nutritional services.