Recently, the results of the J.D. Power Asia Pacific 2014 Malaysia Customer Service Index (CSI) Study was released.
click to read J.D. Power Asia Pacific 2014 Malaysia Customer Service Index (CSI) Study
The study measures overall service satisfaction among owners who sent their vehicles for service maintenance and repair work at authorised service centres during the first 12 to 24 months of ownership.
This year is also the first time the study examines service satisfaction exclusively on the mass market segment, so premium brands such as BMW or Mercedes-Benz were not included.
Five factors of dealership performance were examined in order to evaluate new vehicle owner satisfaction – service quality (38%); vehicle pick-up (20%); service initiation (14%); service advisor (14%); and service facility (14%).
“Brands need to focus on the entire service process—from helping customers secure service appointments, to providing top-quality services, to faster service turnaround times, to having friendly and knowledgeable service advisors—all of which contribute to overall customer satisfaction,” said country head, Malaysia, J.D. Power Asia Pacific Rajaswaran Tharmalingam.
Toyota achieved the highest ranking in overall customer service satisfaction among mass market brands, performing especially in the service facility sector, and Nissan came in second while Isuzu and Mazda tied for third rank.
Managing director, Automotive Aftersales Training, Consulting & Services of ACS AsiaPac Devindran Ramanathan, who is also a contributor for CBT noted that the top brands above the Mass Market Average line are all Japanese brands.
“This is something rare which I did not notice in previous years,” he said.
He also said the points difference between the top six brands is the closest he has seen in the study results for the last five years.
“The finishing amongst the top five brands is a photo-finish six point gap, with only two points between the top four brands.”
He has also done an analysis on the results of the study, concluding that the Japanese consistently deliver their promises.
“Interestingly when I did my own analysis of the JD Power results from 2010 to the most recent 2014, having removed the premium market cars and Isuzu from the list so that we can compare apples with apples, Honda has been the most consistent having achieved pole positions three times within the five years, in 2010, 2011 and 2012, second in 2013 and fourth this year after excluding Isuzu from the analysis,” he said.
“All the above Japanese companies are without a doubt Customer Service Champions who consistently deliver the “brand promise” and whose performance continuously exceed the customer’s expectation.
“As a result, they continue to win market share and maximize their financial performance in the Aftersales areas
“Simply put, achieving high Service Satisfaction yields best business results.”
