Delivering a great customer experience is now top priority for many telecoms companies. As the range of products and service options increases, the customer experience has become a critical differentiator. Staff at every level - and even suppliers - are rated against the customer experience they deliver, and are rewarded accordingly.

But how do you really understand and assess the experience your company delivers?

At KPMG, we aimed to achieve this understanding by becoming the customer.

• We ‘mystery shopped’ prepaid mobile products and services in 25 countries and from 106 operators.
• We experienced customer service through retail, online and contact center channels.
• We developed powerful insights into how operators are really performing as they strive to deliver a great customer experience.

Retail customer experience - consistency is key

There is a need to deliver a consistent retail experience across flagship, corporate-owned and franchised stores.

Online customer experience - MVNOs lead the way

Only 45 percent of operators sampled sold SIMs online and online support for buyers was often less than satisfactory.

Contact center & IVR customer experience - managing expectations

Customers often simply wish to speak to someone on the phone about certain issues. Our study found IVR systems were often complex.

Product choices - increased choice and complexity

Two global trends were identified: operators are typically offering many plans with many variations and MVNOs are opting for simplicity.

Top-up customer experience - developing countries win out

The range of top-up methods available is wide and growing. The once popular scratch cards have largely been replaced by e-top-up and bank apps.