Customer Care Ratings

JD Power’s 2009 Customer Care Study:
Alltel, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless rank highest

Increased First-Contact Problem Resolution and Shortened Hold Times
Drive Improvements in Wireless Customer Care Performance

According to the J.D. Power and Associates 2009 Wireless Customer Care Performance Study-Volume 2 realeased in August 2009, Overall wireless customer care performance has improved considerably as customers report shorter hold times and improved rates of problem resolution on the first contact.

The study finds that overall customer care performance has improved considerably to 735 on a 1,000-point scale, up 12 points from the first wave of the study released in February. Satisfaction improves across all methods of contact, as a result of increased first-contact problem resolution and shorter wait times. More than three-fourths (76%) of calls to customer service are resolved on the first contact, compared with just 66 percent six months ago. In addition, hold times now average 5.55 minutes, compared with 6.58 minutes in February 2009.

Alltel, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless rank highest in wireless customer care performance, in a tie, each with a score of 747. Alltel performs particularly well when contacts are resolved through customer visits to the retail store and ARS, while T-Mobile's strength is in transferring customers from an automated response system to a live service representative. Verizon Wireless performs well with regard to identifying customer problems quickly and resolving them efficiently with service representatives.

The 2009 Wireless Customer Care Performance Study-Volume 2 is based on responses from more than 12,000 wireless customers who contacted their carrier's customer care department within the past year. The study was fielded January through June 2009.

Carrier	Index Score
Alltel
AT&T
Sprint Nextel
T-Mobile
Verizon Wireless

Source: J.D. Power and Associates 2009 Wireless Customer Care Performance Study

The study also finds several key wireless customer care patterns:

• Nearly one-third of contacts pertain to the customer's cost of service.
   
• Among customers who contact their carrier by phone two to three times to resolve an issue, 17 percent report they are likely to switch wireless carriers in the future. In comparison, just 10 percent of customers are likely to switch when the issue is resolved in one contact.
   
• Fifteen percent of contacts result from calls or text messages originated by the wireless carrier. Those customers who contact their carrier after receiving these communications are more satisfied (744, on average), than customers who do not receive proactive contact from their carrier (730).