If you hear from a third party about a complaint to do with your business, you can still act on it and try to resolve the situation. For example, you might bump into a friend in the street. While chatting with your friend, he mentions a particular shoe shop and you immediately start to tell him about a bad experience you had with the shop. Unbeknown to you, your friend is a good friend of the person who owns the shoe shop and he goes back and tells them the story you told him. If this business owner is like most people, he will simply throw imaginary darts at you for complaining. However, if he is really smart, he would give you a call or drop you a letter saying that he had heard about your experience and would like a chance to rectify your complaint.
Who does this? No one. Why? Because it's easier not to confront the situation. We all hear complains on a day-to-day basis from friends, family members and associates. It's quite rare that complaints about our own business get back to us via the grapevine, but if they do, it's a fabulous opportunity to take control of the situation and to try and win back the customer.