A new study from J.D. Power – namely, the J.D. Power 2018 Canada Wireless Customer Care Study, has determined that customer service issues may be the primary cause of subscriber churn in Canada. In fact, as many as 32-percent of respondents to the study said that it took a higher-than-average amount of effort to get any issues they were having resolved. Worse still, 42-percent of those who ran into such issues either switched or considered switching wireless service providers. Moreover, as many as 62-percent of customers surveyed use their phone to contact a company for service That’s despite the trends toward using social media as a preferred method in other countries. The shift is likely due to a drop in satisfaction with those channels, which landed at around 61 points lower than the industry average of 757 points for phone calls. J.D. Power utilizes a 1,000 point scale for its rating system.
For those that called in for customer service, those who chose to get a “virtual” call-back instead being placed on hold waited an average of nearly an hour for service. That’s as compared to those who held on the line only needing to wait for around 12 minutes. Taken in combination, the two issues saw a total average drop of around 223-points dropped from the overall scores for companies having the issues – 47 points for wait times and 186 for challenges in receiving service. Lastly, speaking to management didn’t seem to help those who faced difficulties, with only around 73-percent noting that the issues were resolved.
Those aspects of customer service also played a pivotal role in J.D. Power’s ranking of Canadian wireless service providers by customer care for 2018. Virgin Mobile came out on top with a narrow lead over Koodo Mobile, SaskTel. The company managed a score of 793, out of 1,000, compared to the other two companies’ scores landing at 792. Videotron also managed a higher-than-average ranking with 789 points, whereas Fido and Telus Mobility beat out the industry average with 762 points and 756 points, respectively. Falling well below the industry average of 753 were Freedom Mobile and Rogers Wireless, which only racked up 741 points each. Bell MTS and Bell Mobility ranked dead last with 728 and 726 points.