Cell phone-based feedback system lets Budget Rent A Car respond quickly and to customer complaints
Editor’s note: Johann Leitner is president in the San Diego office of South Africa research firm Touchwork.
As part of the global Budget organization, Budget Rent a Car in South Africa operates a large network of over 80 branches located throughout South Africa, Namibia and Botswana. In-terminal branches at all major airports ensure that no matter how customers choose to reach their destination, Budget Rent a Car is never far away.
In the highly competitive car rental business, Budget strives to consistently deliver world-class customer service and continuously find ways to further improve the experiences of its customers. With the relative ease of moving to a competitor the need to retain existing customers and build brand loyalty are critical for success.
It is especially important to immediately identify customers who are dissatisfied with Budget and to rapidly address their concerns. Budget caters primarily to the business traveler, so the lifetime value of each customer is substantial.
As most travelers are busy and in a hurry to get to their next destination, Budget strives to minimize the time it takes customers to collect or return a car. As an example, the Budget Fastbreak program removes the necessity for the customer to sign any documentation at the time of vehicle collection. On arrival, the customer simply proceeds directly to the Fastbreak dedicated counter, where the keys are handed over. “Unfortunately these and other programs limit the opportunity to interact with customers at a personal level and obtain feedback about their experiences with the car or service they received,” says Bev Vorster, Budget business support manager. “Customers who have had a negative experience, in most instances, do not have a channel to complain and simply move to a competitor the next time they hire a car while sharing their negative experience with friends and colleagues.”
Low response rate
To get customer feedback, Budget in the past had used pre-paid reply survey cards. However the effectiveness of this method to capture and immediately respond to customer issues was very poor and the overall response rate very low. It typically took up to three months for a customer to get a reply to their complaint as the survey cards had to be delivered to a central point at the head office, manually captured into a computer system, assessed by a customer service representative, sorted in terms of type of complaint and then an appropriate response had to be formulated. In most cases the customer simply received a form letter from the Budget CEO advising that their issue was being looked into and steps were being taken to avoid a recurrence. This delayed and impersonal method of communication had the potential of further alienating customers and driving them to competitors.
In 2004 the Budget corporate customer service management team was introduced to the ESP customer feedback management system developed by South Africa-based research firm Touchwork. The system captures and provides customer feedback using cell phone-based text messaging, letting Budget immediately act on negative feedback and address customer concerns. Budget realized that this would resolve many of the shortcomings of the reply card process and enable it to further differentiate itself from competitors.
With the widespread use of cell phones across all sectors of the population and the growing use of text messaging, Budget also wanted to be seen as an innovator in using new technologies to further enhance its reputation as a leader in its space.
Core part
The ongoing customer satisfaction campaign was launched in May 2004 and forms a core part of Budget’s customer satisfaction and performance management initiatives.
Budget determined that the following six survey questions represented the most critical issues related to a customer’s experience. A simple yes/no response to each question was deemed adequate to identify service delivery issues and initiate follow up action.
Q.1: Did you receive fast and courteous service when you rented your car?
Q.2: Did you receive fast and courteous service when you returned your car?
Q.3: Were our people neat in appearance and pleasing in attitude?
Q.4: Was your car clean inside and out?
Q.5: Was your car in good mechanical condition?
Q.6: Would you rent from Budget again?
In addition to these responses, customers had to provide a branch code and could include additional comments.
These questions, along with simple instructions on how to send a response, are printed on a hanger (Figure 1) which is placed on the rearview mirror of every car. This placement ensures that the customer will notice the survey, as the hanger must be removed before driving the car. Posters were also created for display within each branch.
As an incentive to submit a response, customers are guaranteed 50 miles with the Voyager frequent flyer program provided by South African Airways (SAA). As Budget caters primarily to business travelers and has a partnership with SAA, the majority of its customers are SAA Voyager members and the 50 miles was deemed to be a meaningful incentive, one representing the equivalent of miles that could be earned via a $100 credit card purchase.
Budget branch personnel are not required to do anything more except than to bring the campaign to the attention of customers. Branch managers are instantly notified by an SMS text message whenever a negative response is received and are tasked to immediately follow up with the customer. Regional and corporate managers are also notified via e-mail.
Fivefold increase
Since the launch of the campaign, there has been a fivefold increase in the number of responses versus the number that were obtained using the pre-paid reply cards. It is anticipated that as customers become even more familiar with text messaging, the response rate will increase further.
All responses are stored in the ESP database and are available 24/7 on a secure Web site. A range of management reports is provided to identify trends and determine a customer satisfaction index for corporate reporting purposes. These are shown graphically as bar, pie and line graphs and include: response counts by branch, region as well as totals; general overview and question breakdown; negative feedback weekly, monthly and total; negative feedback by branch, region and total; negative response spread by question. Figure 2 shows a typical summary report of all negative responses by question over a six-month period.
Over 90 percent of responses have indicated that customers are completely satisfied with their experience and have included comments such as:
— “Very impressive service.”
— “Superb as always.”
— “Excellent service and good rate. Many thanks.”
— “My couple of complaints handled promptly.”
— “Nicely done!”
— “1st class.”
— “Efficient and helpful.”
Responses with negative ratings have given Budget quantitative information regarding areas requiring attention. This includes both overall issues that must be addressed at a corporate level such as improving certain processes and procedures as well as issues at specific branches.
Examples of comments received with negative responses include:
— “Car struggled to turn over every time I started it!”
— “Nice quick friendly service but the parking bays need to be open so the trolley can fit thru when returning the car.”
— “Ensure more staff on Fridays!”
Core tools
Based on the success of the campaign to date, Budget plans to continue to use the ESP system to obtain customer feedback, Vorster says. “It forms one of the core tools Budget uses in its quest for service excellence and has greatly assisted our customer retention and satisfaction initiatives.”
Budget’s assessment and conclusions regarding the use of the ESP system for its customer satisfaction campaign are as follows:
- Text messaging is providing an additional channel to communicate with customers and help build relationships.
- The immediate notification of branch, regional and head-office management ensures full visibility of customer issues.
- Areas for improvement are highlighted.
- Underperforming branches can be identified, enabling Budget corporate to take corrective action.
- Store managers are immediately notified of dissatisfied customers and can take appropriate steps to address the issues and prevent recurrences.
- Branch managers can compare their performance with that of the national average in an objective manner and identify areas for improvement.
“The most significant benefit has been the total surprise and positive reaction of customers when, after submitting a negative response, they are immediately contacted by a manager to address their issues,” says Vorster. “In almost every case, customers who had indicated that they would not again rent from Budget were converted into repeat customers with a much-enhanced perception of Budget as a company.”