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Online shoppers get savvy in run-up to Xmas
There's no excuse for poor customer service...

By Julian Goldsmith

Published: Monday 05 November 2007

The vast majority (86 per cent) of online consumers suffer some sort of difficulty in making their purchase.

A survey of more than 2,000 UK consumers, aged 16 or older, showed 37 per cent of those who experience problems with an online transaction prefer to abandon it altogether.

Two in five said they would never go back to a retailer if they received poor customer service from its call centre when calling about a website problem.

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The survey, conducted by Harris Interactive for customer service software specialist Tealeaf, also found 88 per cent of online shoppers expect to get the same level of service on a retailer's website as they would in the store.

Tealeaf CEO, Rebecca Ward, said after a decade of ecommerce, UK consumers have very high expectations of their online experiences, yet many companies doing business online are still failing to deliver an acceptable level of service to internet customers.

A separate survey has pinpointed a key emerging factor in consumers' online decision-making process. The research, which polled 2,000 adults aged 18 or over and was carried out by YouGov for customer review service Reevoo, found 60 per cent of online shoppers believe an independent product review by another shopper would influence their decision to buy.

But 36 per cent said they are worried about the authenticity of retailer-managed review programmes and 84 per cent say they would like some sort of kite-mark to reassure them a review is from a bona-fide customer.