Mobile customers speak out

With hundreds of different mobile deals on the market it's becoming even more difficult for people to differentiate between them. To assist people when choosing their provider moneysupermarket.com has launched its mobile satisfaction survey.

The survey provides an independent overview of the service offered by mobile phone networks, with users ranking each out of 10 on customer service, technical support, network coverage, billing, ability to deliver its promises and reliability.

The average score for overall service was six out of 10 with O2 contract customers ranking the provider top with an overall service score of 6.4. T-Mobile PAYG customers are the least satisfied, scoring the provider just 5.3.

T-Mobile was ranked the lowest in all eight categories of the survey. Its pay-as-you-go customers voted the network poorest for clarity of charges; however, its contract customers found them to have the clearest invoices.

Rob Barnes, head of broadband and mobiles at moneysupermarket.com, said: "With more phones than people in the UK its clear mobile phone networks have become extremely complacent. In a churn market little emphasis is placed on customer retention and instead attentions are focussed towards heavy marketing campaigns full of promises. However our survey shows customers are some way off being satisfied.

"Pay-as-you-go customers are getting the roughest ride as networks focus their service on their seemingly 'loyal' contract customers; respondents placed Vodafone and O2's contract service top for most categories."

Some disgruntled customers are already looking at other networks, as the survey showed one in seven (14 per cent) would change provider but feel it's too much hassle, eight per cent said they had already made their mind up to move providers. A third (32 per cent) said they would not recommend their network to anyone else.

Barnes added: "If networks fail to deliver then customers need to voice their opinion's with their feet and leave for another provider. Ofcom's regulation on porting should make this easier for customers to change and take the hassle out of the process. Currently at two days, next year it will take just two hours, giving more power to the consumer."