J.D. Power Study: Maruti Suzuki & Honda Tied For Top Spot For After Sales Customer Service

Most notably, Maruti Suzuki holds the top spot for the 17th consecutive year and Honda has for the first time hit the top spot. Hyundai and Tata were tied to the third spot scoring 888 going on to become the most improved nameplates in the study.

The overall service satisfaction in the mass market segment in the country rose by 14 points to 880 on a point scale of 1,000 in 2016 from 866 in 2015.

In the West region, the overall satisfaction is 900, while the North region scored 857. This was due to strong differences in customer behavior, preferences, and expectations on their post sales service.

Mohit Arora, executive director at JD Power said, that in an astounding diverse market like India where every state and region have its own unique characteristics and needs, dealers will need to capitalize on every customer interaction opportunity to develop points of differentiation and to deliver on those expectations.

He further added, to being attuned to the differing customer needs across the country, dealerships can continuously adapt their service processes to consistently deliver a superior customer experience.

The study found that dealers are improving their communication activities with customers at every given opportunity and that is having a positive impact overall satisfaction.

Almost nine out of ten (89 percent) customers said that they are being reminded by the dealers about the service intervals which is an increase of 4 percent compared to 85 percent in 2015.

Also, the customer were informed about when to schedule the next service which saw an increase from 83 percent in 2015 to 89 percent in 2016.

Kaustav Roy, director at JD Power said that dealers are at the front line of interacting with the customers and hence they represent the automotive brand they carry.

He added that it is very critical that every communication milestone is handled properly. Any gap to this communication might have the unintended effect of lowering satisfaction as well as customer loyalty and the negative impact may be magnified when it is passed on through word of mouth.

Among the customers who were highly satisfied with their dealer service, 92 percent said they would definitely revisit their service dealer for after warranty service. However, only 44 percent said they were dissatisfied.