Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Gulf News
Dubai: If you're looking for good customer service, you will most definitely find it in restaurants and coffee shops.
According to a study dubbed 'Are you being served?' by Grass Roots, a performance improvement specialist, over 70 per cent of the staff in the region's fast food sector scored excellent ratings from consumers. Staff in this category made the most eye contact and smiled often.
Car shoppers aren't as lucky, though. Consumers visiting car showrooms reported disappointing feedback - 57 per cent of them had to actively find a member of staff to help them and almost one in two (47 per cent) had to wait more than three minutes before being served.
The study also revealed that almost half of the sales staff in the automotive outlets had the tendency not to check if customers had what they needed - which is why customers visiting car showrooms are the least likely to return to or recommend friends to a showroom.
Overall, customer service in the region's retail sector still has ample room for improvement. Grass Roots' report, which collated feedback from shoppers in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and UAE, said retailers were missing sales opportunities by failing to build customer loyalty.
"Employees lack hard sales skills, from how to ascertain customer needs to knowledge of the very products they sell. While the Gulf is stronger on soft skills, low levels of initiative mean staff often fail to truly make a customer feel valued or satisfied," the report said.
For the past two months, Grass Roots sent genuine customers to 350 automotive outlets, fast food and coffee shops, banks and those dealing with mobile phone products in the region. In the UAE, the survey focused on large urban areas in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah and Al Ain, where almost 100 shops were visited.
The study found that one in four customers, or about 23 per cent, did not intend to return to the outlets they had visited and 27 per cent said they would not recommend the shops to friends or family. When asked to rate their overall service experience, consumers appeared unimpressed, giving retailers an average score of 69 per cent.
"This is not an overly impressive figure and demonstrates that service levels in this region are not in line with the rapid expansion and investment that the region's retail sector has seen in the past 12 months," according to Mark Spicer, operations director at Grass Roots.
The number of non-repeat customers is a point for concern, especially at this time when more retail outlets have opened during the economic downturn.
"With nearly one-third of shoppers saying they would not return to or recommend the outlet, the implications in terms of lost sales opportunities are alarming," says Spicer.
Retailers interviewed by Gulf News said they were constantly employing new initiatives, such as staff trainings, to serve their customers better.
"We know that shoppers today require and expect a very high level of service and we are working continuously to deliver that. We conduct regular assessments and gap analyses of the customer service levels by using various tools such as mystery shopping, customer surveys... and upgrade the systems continuously," said Saifee Rupawala, chief executive officer of LuLu Hypermarkets.
Banks are not to be outdone either. At HSBC, improvement of customer service is addressed through training, development and recruitment of staff, as well the creation of electronic banking units or customer service centres in malls and other convenient locations.
Its banking services such as Premier, Status and Amanah have also been modified to serve varying needs of all types of customers.
"We recognise that we have to improve the customer service we provide to our valuable customers& We have introduced a number of initiatives to improve our customer service and I am sure that our customers will see a marked improvement in the level of service they receive from HSBC," said Abdul Fattah Sharaf, chief executive of personal financial services at HSBC Middle East and North Africa.
According to the Grass Roots survey, retail outlets in the Gulf are at their weakest when it comes to giving customers product knowledge and meeting their needs.
About 41 per cent of the staff did not check whether customers had found what they wanted or needed while 40 per cent did not recommend or guide customers to a product.
In terms of sales skills and initiative, about 34 per cent of the staff did not bother to ask questions to establish details about what the customer needed.
As far as friendliness of the staff was concerned, 35 per cent of them did not smile at customers while 29 per cent did not say goodbye to the customer.
On the positive side, the region's retailers scored well in terms of overall staff attitudes. About 83 per cent of the staff were deemed helpful and 82 per cent were considered friendly. About 65 per cent greeted the customer with a smile, while 71 per cent said goodbye to customers.
A good majority of the shops also made a good impression on their customers as 94 per cent of shoppers reported clean and tidy environment.
Speed of service proved to be positive as well, with 71 per cent of the shoppers saying they were served within three minutes.
In terms of overall customer service levels per country, performance index scores showed that the UAE was a clear winner after garnering a score of 78 per cent.
Bahrain came second with 73 per cent, followed by Kuwait and Saudi Arabia with 70 per cent and Qatar with 65 per cent.
The study found that the UAE has the most positive sales staff in the region.
Gulf News 2009. All rights reserved.
