Friday, September 30, 2005

Fri - Dell struggling with customer support

In an article I recently wrote in businessuncut daily on the luxury PC, I stated that I had a concern with Dell's ability to deliver a support service worthy of such luxury products. I may have been onto something.

Complaints about Dell to the Better Business Bureau rose 23% in 2004 from the year before, and they're up another 5% this year. And Dell's customer-satisfaction rating fell 6.3%, to a score of 74, in a survey by the University of Michigan.

Dell may well be a victim of its own huge success in selling PC's to corporate and consumer America, after all, scaling customer support services is one of industry's toughest challenges. Just look at the airline sector for evidence. And, Dell also has to struggle with lower and lower margins when selling consumer computers in particular.

Dell has announced a raft of improvements, including hiring a load more support technicians and new support packages. They'll need to move fast on this issue as customer satisfaction remains consistently high for Apple, and they'll be competing more directly with Dell next year as they launch Intel computers. Plus, a reinvigorated HP have made customer service their core competitive weapon v Dell!

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