Windhoek
Last week marked the beginning of the second customer service household survey. Business Intelligence Africa (BIA), a Namibian research company, has again been contracted by the Polytechnic of Namibia’s Harold Pupkewitz Graduate School of Business to carry out the fieldwork for the survey.
Approximately 1 500 households nation-wide will be targeted and their occupants interviewed on their experience of customer service in fifteen key industries that have a major impact on our daily lives, namely: supermarkets, banks, health, municipal, energy, telecommunications, home affairs, inland revenue, insurance, post office, education , vehicle retail, fast food outlets, restaurant chains and leisure resorts.
Within the next two months BIA will target households with their team of approximately 30 data collectors. They will have a structured questionnaire with easy to answer questions. The interviews will be done anonymously and results will be reported only in group format without identifying any names or addresses of interviewees.
“Last year when we did the survey, we visited 1 500 households throughout the country and these interviews resulted in around 7 200 service incidents and a wide range of businesses being rated. We were overwhelmed by the good response of the Namibian population and hope that we will again get the warm welcome during the 2015 survey,” said Karen Fietz of BIA.
The survey aims to promote customer service awareness and initiate a customer service movement for service excellence in the country and Africa.
The results of the survey will be announced at the Namibian Customer Service Awards and Conference on September 14-16 at the Namibia Institute of Public Administration and Management (NIPAM) where the best performing companies or organisations will receive the customer service excellence awards within different categories.
Professor Grafton Whyte, Director of the Harold Pupkewitz Graduate School of Business, says: “We are hoping that Namibian consumers will actively participate in the survey as they did last year. Our aim is to establish Namibia as the African research centre of excellent customer service in the region. This year’s conference and awards theme is ‘Expecting better: Delivering more.’ Using this theme we want to facilitate bridging the gap between suppliers and customers by encouraging motivated suppliers and informed customers.”