Nam Hyun-woo has worked as a staff writer at The Korea Times since 2013, mostly covering business and politics. He currently belongs to the Business Desk where he covers topics such as emerging tech, AI, ICT and Korea's chaebol community. Prior to joining the team, he was the paper's correspondent for the presidential office of Korea during the Yoon Suk Yeol and Moon Jae-in administrations.
Preparedness against pandemic sways customer satisfaction
Severance Hospital in Seodaemun District, western Seoul / Courtesy of Severance Hospital
By Nam Hyun-woo
By Nam Hyun-woo
The 2020 NCSI
Despite the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic, customers' overall satisfaction with companies has improved, showing domestic firms have increased efforts to satisfy customers' demands amid slowdowns across industries.
On the other hand, customers have expressed their disappointment with universities and education institutions, as many students were unsatisfied with schools' handling of setbacks in academic schedules and their poor preparedness for online classes.
According to the annual National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI) for 2020, the average score for 316 companies, colleges and public institutions in 75 industrial sectors stood at 77 points, up 0.3 points or 0.4 percent from 76.7 points posted for 2019.
This is the highest score the Korea Productivity Center (KPC) has recorded. It started conducting this survey in 1998.
Of note in the 2020 survey is hospitals' improvement in customer satisfaction.
Among the top 10 companies on the overall rankings, seven were hospitals, with five hospitals sweeping from No. 2 to No. 6. Also, the average score for healthcare and social welfare service industries was tallied at 80, up one point from a year earlier.
The KPC analyzed that the pandemic has driven patients to concentrate on university hospitals and large medical centers, while the hospitals have made thorough efforts to prevent further spread of the virus. The public has highly appreciated their disinfection efforts, which resulted in higher scores for hospitals, the KPC said.
In last year's NCSI, Severance Hospital sat at No. 2 in overall rankings with 83 points, up from No. 9 in the 2019 survey. This is the 10th consecutive year that Severance Hospital has been leading the hospital sector in the NCSI.
The finance and insurance industry also showed an improvement in their average score, up 2 points to stand at 77. Despite initial anticipation that COVID-19 would have a negative impact on insurance sales or banking services, financial firms have provided their services online, following years of efforts to digitize their businesses, the KPC said.
In last year's survey, Samsung C&T's construction division retained its top position with a score of 85. The builder has been leading the overall rankings since 2019 and maintaining its pole position in the apartment construction sector for the past 23 years.
On the other hand, education institutions suffered a decline in their scores, with their average score dropping 3 points from last year to 74.
The KPC attributed this to students' dissatisfaction with universities' and colleges' online curricula. With the pandemic forcing many schools to turn to digital classes, 40.6 percent of students surveyed said they have experienced connection and other types of errors while taking online classes, 32.5 percent said they have experienced inconveniences in administrative issues, and 27.7 percent reported issues related to lecture quality.
“Despite the COVID-19 pandemic and chronic global economic slowdown, Korean firms' overall efforts to innovate their products and improve customer service have raised the average score,” the KPC said in its report.
In the 2020 NCSI, top rankers have changed in 13 industrial sectors, while 11 sectors have at least two companies or institutions sharing the top position, showing that companies engaged in heated competition to improve customer satisfaction.
The 2020 NCSI is based on polls on 88,032 customers in Korea throughout last year.