How satisfied are your customers?

The Institute of Customer Service (ICS) has just published its latest UK Customer Satisfaction Index (UKCSI). Every six months the ICS surveys 26,000 UK adults and asks them questions about their experiences with UK organisations across all channels.

Given Eptica recently completed its own research into online customer service it is fascinating to compare the two surveys. Here are the findings of Eptica's multichannel study on the percentage of questions organisations were able to answer on average through their website, per sector, with the UKCSI figures in brackets:

1. Fashion Retail, 64% (combined non-food retail 4^th in UKCSI)

2= Travel, 54% (2^nd in UKCSI)

2= Consumer Electronics Retail, 54% (combined non-food retail 4^th in UKCSI)

4. Utilities, 52% (12^th in UKCSI)

5. Insurance, 50% (7^th in UKCSI)

6. Food and Wine, 48% (1^st in UKCSI)

7. Consumer Electronics manufacturers, 48% (not included in UKCSI)

8= Banking, 43% (8^th in UKCSI)

8= CD/DVD/Book retailers, 43% (combined non-food retail 4^th in UKCSI)

10. Telecoms, 42% (10^th in UKCSI)   We’ve taken five key findings from this comparison:

• Some sectors, such as banks and telecoms companies perform poorly whatever the study
• Food and wine retail comes top in UKCSI, but only 6^th in the Eptica Study – evidence that the majority of customer service efforts are focused on stores rather than online channels
• Travel is consistently high in both indexes, although the UKCSI survey does include different companies to the Eptica Study
• The wide differences within the various parts of the non-food retail sector captured by the Eptica Study don’t come through in the UKCSI index which amalgamates them altogether
• Utilities do a lot better online and via email than in general consumer perceptions – presumably linked to recent price increases rather than how they actually treat queries

What the two surveys do agree on is that there are wide discrepancies between different companies – the average UKCSI score is 77.3, but the highest company (John Lewis) scores 87.5. And within the Eptica study two companies scored 100 per cent when it came to answering questions, but many languished behind with 10 or 20 per cent. With increased competition and consumer spending dropping, UK companies need to raise their customer service game if they want to survive and thrive.  

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