Toyota scores in customer survey

The Synovate Quality Awards recognise service excellence and are acknowledged as the highest accolade for customer service in the South African motor industry.

The 2009 results stem from a survey conducted over a 12-month period between January and December 2008 and is based on interviews with more than 55,000 customers who purchased or serviced a vehicle during this time.

Recognition is given to outstanding achievers in the following categories:

• Customer satisfaction when purchasing a Passenger vehicle
  
• Customer satisfaction when servicing a Passenger vehicle
  
• Customer satisfaction when purchasing a Light Commercial Vehicle (LCV)
  
• Customer satisfaction when servicing a Light Commercial Vehicle

Toyota achieved gold awards in all four categories, triumphing in the LCV Service category with an 84.2% rating - a position it has held for the past four years.

In the LCV Purchase category Toyota scored a rating of 91.4%.

In both Passenger Vehicle categories Toyota repeated its solid gold performance of the past four years, with ratings far above the industry average - 91.4% for purchase experience and 83.8% for servicing.

“We are delighted with our performance, particularly in the current tough economic times where customer satisfaction is even more important than before,” said Andrew Kirby, senior vice president: sales and marketing at Toyota SA.

“We strive to achieve an emotional connection with our customers, building relationships based on mutual respect. To this extent a Customer Experience loyalty programme has been developed to measure the holistic experience customers have through all stages of vehicle ownership and across all levels of interaction with the dealership,” said Kirby.