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Customer Experience Excellence Report UK 2024/25

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For the last 14 years we’ve looked at how the world’s best organisations connect customer experience excellence to lower costs and faster growth. In 2023/24 we’ve reached a tipping point in business adoption of artificial intelligence (AI), which is radically re-writing the rules of the game.

As with any paradigm shift, business leaders and society are still coalescing around a consistent way of managing AI. Many different models have emerged, but in this report we explore how the world’s leading brands are thinking about AI as a new, game-changing type of colleague. One with unique management challenges, integration risks and strategic advantages.

By examining emerging best practice in AI implementation, we provide an early view of what CEOs and other business leaders need to do to deliver real human value, at a low cost, as safely as possible.

Pre-register the 2024/25 Customer Experience Excellence report

This year marks the 15th anniversary of our Customer Experience Excellence (CEE) research in the UK. Building on last year's study, “Say hello to your new AI colleague”, this report examines the transformative role of digital and AI technologies in reshaping customer experience. We explore how these technologies can be designed to connect emotionally with customers, build trust, and create a new era of cost-effective, AI-enabled CX.

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Our Customer Experience Excellence Data

14

Years of research

40

Global markets

4000+

Brands evaluated globally

376

2023/24 UK brands ranked

13143

2023/24 UK consumers interviewed

Customer Experience Excellence 2023/24: UK Top 10

  • 1 first direct
  • 2 Lush
  • 3 American Express
  • 4 John Lewis & Partners
  • 5 Nationwide
  • 6 Hilton Hotels & Resorts
  • 7 Specsavers
  • 8 Chase
  • 9 Coventry Building Society
  • 10 Vision Express

Source: Based on the views of 13,143 consumers in the UK CEE 2023/24 research

UK top 100 results 2023/24

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The Six Pillars of Experience Excellence

For the last 20 years, offers have been synonymous with experience. The Six Pillars of experience excellence have been repeatedly established as the universal set of emotional qualities. They define every outstanding customer experience which can create loyalty and drive growth. More relevant than ever, these pillars are providing businesses with an essential way to navigate the coming change.

Organisations that understand and deliver against The Six Pillars have always showcased enhanced outcomes, quick growth and greater shareholder value.

Six pillars section image

Integrity

Being trustworthy and engendering trust

Integrity

Integrity is an outcome of consistent organisational behaviour that demonstrates trustworthiness. There are trust-building events where organisations have the need to publicly react to a difficult situation, and trust building moments where individual actions by staff add up to create trust in the organisation as a whole. For all customers, it is the degree to which the organisation delivers on its promises that is consistently top of mind.

Resolution

Turning a poor experience into a great one

Resolution

Customer recovery is highly important. Even with the best processes and procedures things will go wrong. Great companies have a process that not only puts the customer back in the position they should have been in as rapidly as possible, but also make the customer feel really good about the experience. A sincere apology and acting with urgency are two crucial elements of successful Resolution.

Expectations

Managing, meeting and exceeding customer expectations

Expectations

Customers have Expectations about how their needs will be met, increasingly set by the best brands they have encountered. Understanding, delivering and, if possible, exceeding Expectations is a key skill of great organisations. Some organisations are able to make statements of clear intent that set Expectations (e.g. “never knowingly undersold”) while others set the Expectation accurately (“delivery in 48 hours”). And then delight the customer when they exceed it.

Time and Effort

Minimising customer effort and creating frictionless processes

Time and Effort

Customers are time poor and are increasingly looking for instant gratification. Removing unnecessary obstacles, impediments and bureaucracy to enable the customer to achieve their objectives quickly and easily have been shown to increase loyalty. Many companies are discovering how to use time as a source of competitive advantage. Equally, there are clear cost advantages to saving time, as long as the other Pillars are not compromised.

Personalisation

Using individualised attention to drive an emotional connection

Personalisation

Personalisation is the most valuable component of most experiences. It involves demonstrating that you understand the customer’s specific circumstances and will adapt the experience accordingly. Use of name, individualised attention, knowledge of preferences and past interactions all add up to an experience that feels personal.

Empathy

Achieving an understanding of the customer's circumstances to drive deep rapport

Empathy

Empathy is the emotional capacity to show you understand someone else’s experience. Empathy creating behaviours are central to establishing a strong relationship and involve reflecting back to the customer that you know how they feel. Then going that one extra step because you understand how they feel.

Customer Experience Excellence 2023/24: Sector Overview

Consumer and retail

The shift online has weakened, high levels of inflation mean costs have escalated, shifting consumer demands and loyalty in the wake of rising prices have driven an intense focus on margins.

Read more
Technology, media, and telecoms

The battle for consumer attention continues. The value for money demands of consumers coupled with ever increasing service expectations is leading to a focus on costs and technology-enabled productivity.

Read more
Energy and natural resources

With the UK in the midst of an energy crisis, energy and natural resources companies are facing big challenges. How do they keep the lights on and bills down? And how does that impact their efforts to accelerate the energy transition?

Read more
Banks and building societies

Evolving regulatory change, pressure on cost management and growth, and increased investment in technology and data are dominating the banking sector. To add, disruption from non-traditional players and changing customer expectations have been top of mind across the board.

Read more
Insurance

Tightening regulation, escalating cost inflation, and rising premiums are leading to declining consumer trust. These point to a difficult road ahead for the UK insurance industry.

Read more
Public sector & healthcare

Healthcare, government and public sector organisations and services need to modernise and adapt in a rapidly changing world. With budgets under pressure and citizens demanding ever higher performance, more must be delivered for less.

Read more

Case studies in customer excellence

first direct

first direct

Regains #1 overall position in 2023

Over the past 12 months first direct have seen significant improvements in Personalisation and perceptions of value.

Chris Pitt, CEO of first direct provides an insight as to why he thinks they have performed so well.

Download PDF ⤓
Ocado

Ocado

#1 leader in the grocery sector in 2023

Ocado continues to perform well in our customer experience index and it is also a leading company in our AI adoption index.

Hannah Gibson, CEO of Ocado Retail, explains what lies behind their success.

Download PDF ⤓
Nationwide

Nationwide

Ranked 5th in 2023

As always it is not just one thing but a number of initiatives that have collectively driven the improvement across each of The Six Pillars resulting in higher advocacy and loyalty

Stephen Noakes, Nationwide’s Director of Retail, outlines the actions they have taken.

Download PDF ⤓
Emirates

Emirates

Moved 22 places up to 5th position in 2023

This year, Emirates has moved up 81 places in the UK index, ranking 11th and the number 1 airline. Over the past 12 months, Emirates has improved its Integrity score by 7 percent and Time and Effort by 5 percent.

We spoke to Sir Tim Clark, President of Emirates Airline, to gather his perspective.

Download PDF ⤓
Coventry Building Society

Coventry Building Society

Moved 22 places up to 5th position in 2023

Coventry has boosted its scores in all Six Pillars over the past year, notably in Time and Effort, and Resolution, making customer interactions smoother.

Anne Marie Koukouravas, Samantha Richards, Emma Baxter, and Becci Greenfield from Coventry Building Society explain what is behind the improvement.

Download PDF ⤓
...

UK top 100 results 2023

1

first direct

2

Lush

3

American Express

4

John Lewis & Partners

5

Nationwide

6

Hilton Hotels & Resorts

7

Specsavers

8

Chase

9

Coventry Building Society

10

Vision Express

11

Emirates

12

Richer Sounds

13

Lakeland

14

Ocado

15

Marcus by Goldman Sachs

16

Chanel

17

Atom Bank

18

Waterstones

19

InterContinental Hotels & Resorts

20

Tesco Mobile

21

M&S

22

Everyman Cinemas

23

Monzo

24

M&S Food

25

Apple Store

26

Clarks

27

The Body Shop

28

Leading Online Retailer

29

Haven Holidays

30

Leeds Building Society

31

Screwfix

32

Starling Bank

33

QVC UK

34

Etsy

35

Yorkshire Building Society

36

Jet2

37

Waitrose & Partners

38

Boots

39

ao.com

40

Skipton Building Society

41

Premier Inn

42

The White Company

43

Argos

44

IKEA

45

Bonmarché

46

National Trust

47

Halifax

48

PayPal

49

Hargreaves Lansdown

50

Lloyds Bank

51

Boden

52

Cult Beauty

53

Marriott

54

Aldi

55

White Stuff

56

Harvey Nichols

57

hmv

58

Pharmacy2U

59

Center Parcs

60

Virgin Atlantic

61

FatFace

62

Miller & Carter

63

Uniqlo

64

Next

65

Dreams

66

M&S Bank

67

Tesco Bank

68

Samsung Store

69

Dunelm

70

LOOKFANTASTIC

71

Principality Building Society

72

Booking.com

73

Gymshark

74

Timpson

75

Burberry

76

AA

77

Crowne Plaza

78

Sainsbury's

79

giffgaff

80

Moonpig

81

Schuh

82

Farm Foods

83

LV=

84

Sky Mobile

85

Aldermore

86

Green Flag

87

ASOS

88

Lidl

89

Santander

90

Holiday Inn

91

Virgin Holidays

92

Selfridges & Co

93

Radisson

94

Tesco

95

Joules

96

eBay

97

Superdrug

98

Novotel

99

NS&I

100

Holiday Inn Express

Global report: Artificial Intelligence and the orchestrated customer experience

This year, the KPMG Global Customer Experience Excellence (CEE) 2023-24 report explores what AI will mean to the customer experience.

Go to Report page

Latest Customer Experience Excellence Insights

Download the 2023/24 Customer Experience Excellence report

UK consumers want brands to resolve their problems quickly and with little friction however, they also do not want to interact with faceless technology. Read the CEE UK Report 2023/24 to discover how organisations leading in customer experience are striking the right balance between human and machine when anticipating and responding to customer needs.

Download the report ⤓

Contact us

Tim Knight contact photo

Tim Knight

Partner,

UK Head of Customer & Operations

KPMG in the UK

Contact
Dr Marty Herbert contact photo

Dr Marty Herbert

Director,

UK Head of Experience Transformation

KPMG in the UK

Contact