Saudi International Motor Show in Jeddah - Essay Example

Complaint behavior is a vital phenomenon for service scholars and managers. It is important to understand that it impacts on s perceptions of service experience. Knowledge with regard to complaint behavior offers valuable insights into important areas, more particularly in identification of common service problems. This allows improved service design/delivery, understanding perceived service quality by customers as well as in strategic planning. Arguably, it is important to encourage dissatisfied clients to complain to avoid the risks of losing clients. However, complaints should be minimized by ensuring the clients get quality services which meet their needs. According to DDDDDD, customer complaints should not be minimized by discouraging customers from complaining, rather it should be minimized by addressing the issues that give rise to customer complaints. Typically, such issues are numerous and not all can be eliminated. However, they should be minimized. Additionally, where resources are constrained, it is important to identify the vital issues which need to be prioritized. Saudi Arabian car is unsurprisingly the largest in the Middle East and by far, the most promising. This perhaps explains why manufacturers have placed much investment and hope in this area. In 2013, the car sales hit 570,000 marking a 10% increase from 2012; a trend likely to continue in 2014. The market’s importance was further emphasized in the Saudi International Motor Show in Jeddah highlighting the sharp competition arising from convergence of leading brands and new comers. This places greater emphasis on understanding the reasons behind customer complaints and further sieving into the important reasons which should be accorded greater importance by car sale agents. Understanding customer complaints and the reasons behind the complaints helps the agencies in defining needs of customers and satisfying the needs. The process considered involves the time the client first contacts the agency to seek information about a car to the time of purchase. A typical flow chart for car sales process is provided below, The agencies are responsible for facilitating initial contact with would be buyers, taking the buyers through the negotiation process and eventually selling and handing over the car to the buyers. More often, contact is initiated by a client, courtesy of adverts and referrals. The agents the takes the clients through a range of options available and where no desirable options are available, suggests alternative ways of acquiring and availing the car to the client. Methodology The research was collected from 10 agencies selling cars in Saudi Arabia. Only agencies which kept records of customer and classified the complaints were considered in the research. Although there are many car selling agencies in Saudi Arabia, only the ten were identified as keeping records of customer complaints relevant to the study. The scope of the study ranges from not just the clients who made purchases but also those who contacted the agencies but failed to make a purchase. Using a fishbone diagram, the problems causing customer complaints were described as shown below, Fishbone diagram The cause and effect diagram identifies possible causes for an effect or problem (Antony et al., 2003). It sorts ideas into useful categories. Model development Pareto analysis The Pareto analysis as applied in this project, presumes that 20% of the problems identified results into loss of 80% of the clients. As a matter of fact, the technique helps in narrowing down on the few issues that result into complaints by the clients. As a result, it assists in identifying the areas which should be given optimal attention. As already mentioned, it is presumed that 20% of identified issues are the reason for 80% of the customer complaints. This is based on Pareto principle that states that 80% of issues in end product/service are attributed to 20% of problems in production/service processes (Yin, 2003; Snee & Hoerl, 2005). Two issues are identified as being of great importance to the airline as they contribute to 80% of the lost clients. These include untimely processing and untimely documentation. These two areas emerge as of fundamental importance to successfully implementation of initiatives to lower customer complaints. Read More