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HP Tech Support Quality Improving Compared to Apple in Consumer Survey

August 03, 2011

According to the latest study conducted by Vocal Laboratories Inc (Vocalabs), Apple’s dominance over Dell and HP in customer service quality for phone-based technical support is trending down. The study points out that the automated part of the call is the problem area. Apple’s customer satisfaction score has reduced 15 points from a year ago, whereas HP has improved 9 points over the past two years. The survey was conducted immediately after the support call, and was observed that during the first six months of 2011 the overall satisfaction levels for a “very satisfied” customer was 58% for Apple, 47% for Dell, and 53% for HP.


In the voice support area of the call where the customers interact with a support agent, Apple still holds the number one spot. In the first six months of this year, Apple’s customers said they were “very satisfied” 77%, as compared to 56% of Dell customers and 61% of HP customers. However, using the automated virtual agent, only 24% were “Very Satisfied” with Apple, where as Dell customers were “very satisfied” 36% and HP 40%. During the survey period, about 40% of Apple’s customers were unhappy with the automated part of the call, nearly 21% more than a year ago.

In a release, CEO of Vocalabs Mr. Peter Leppik said, “Apple used to be well ahead of the pack in tech support. Now it would be fair to say that they are merely at the front of the pack. Apple used to lead on nearly every metric for support quality. Now there are several metrics where Apple is tied with its competition, or even trails.”

This survey was conducted by calling the customer immediately after a customer service experience. Customer service quality is tracked by The National Customer Service Survey (NCSS) for several industries. The NCSS is underwritten and conducted by Vocalabs. Vocalabs have extensive customer feedback experience. With their advanced technology platform they can improve and make a lot of difference for all the clients, including communication providers.


Calvin Azuri is a contributing editor for ContactCenterSolutions. To read more of Calvin’s articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Rich Steeves



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