A Singapore survey has found that customers were generally more satisfied with the country’s finance and insurance sectors in 2017 compared to the previous year.
The Customer Satisfaction Index of Singapore (CSISG) study, conducted by Singapore Management University’s Institute of Service Excellence (ISE), revealed that the finance and insurance sectors had a customer satisfaction score of 73.4 points out of 100 in 2017, representing an increase from its 2016 tally of 72.4 points, according to a report by the Singapore Business Review.
Banking, credit cards, and health insurance registered the largest improvements in customer satisfaction, while life insurance and general insurance scores remained relatively unchanged, said ISE. Use of digital channels was also found to increase customer satisfaction.
“There appears to be a positive relationship between usage of digital channels and higher scores across various customer metrics including satisfaction, loyalty, and number of products held with the bank,” said Neeta Lachmandas, executive director of ISE.
Within the insurance sector, customers were least satisfied when dealing with contact centres in the life and health insurance industries. The satisfaction score for those who interacted with a contact centre was 69.1 while those who did not had a score of 73.
“Insurers may wish to consider how they could better resolve customers’ issues through the contact centre by improving areas such as staff knowledge and professionalism,” commented Chen Yongchang, head of research and consulting at ISE.
On a nationwide level, the positive contributions of the finance and insurance industries, as well as the healthcare industry, have helped bump the national customer satisfaction score for 2017 to a record-high of 72.9 points, up from 71.8 points in 2016.
