• by P.J. Bednarski  @pjbtweet, August 1, 2018

A new consumer satisfaction survey released today concludes some non-contract and pre-paid wireless service providers are customer favorites and the big four players — AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint — are not. 

The survey from consumer experience consultancy Market Force Information concludes Consumer Cellular is “ranked as America’s favorite carrier.” That’s the carrier that gives discounts to AARP members and that also has won or placed highly in other rankings in the recent past.

Simple plans, explained simply, also factor in. “In our new convenience economy, ‘simple’ has tremendous value to consumers and those brands that can offer it will prevail in the long term,” Brad Christian, Market Force’s chief customer officer observes.

When looking at all of the wireless providers combined, Consumer Cellular earns a Composite Loyalty Index (CLI)  score of 71%. Cricket and Straight Talk tied for second place with 56% apiece, and Boost Mobile and T-Mobile tied for third. Meanwhile, Verizon came in a distant seventh, while AT&T and Sprint landed on the bottom of the rankings (as shown in the chart above).

Of the big four, T-Mobile ranks first, followed by Verizon and AT&T.  Fourth (and last) was Sprint, with which T-Mobile hopes to merge. 

The report says Consumer Cellular led most categories consumers say they care about, “including value, call strength, plan flexibility, dropped call frequency and data speeds. Verizon narrowly beat out Consumer Cellular for network coverage, as did T-Mobile for access to new products.  Interestingly, the [four] tended to trail in most categories, aside from those related to new technology and products.”

The survey showed a marked uptick in the number of customers shifting from contract plans with term limits to pre-paid and pay-as-you-go options. 

“In the past two years, contract plans saw a 12% drop among consumers — from 62% in 2016 to 50% in 2018. In the same period, the use of pre-paid service grew by 7% and pay-as-you-go by 5%,” the report says. 

Christian tells Marketing Daily the non-contract wave happening in many industries also is in full flower in the wireless business. 

“Many services are transitioning to month-to-month relationships and that is manifesting itself in the wireless space as well,” he writes. “Brands that offer more and more flexibility in the commitment of service will see growth as customers look to mimic their rights and use cases that they enjoy with other services.”

Christian says the significant high marks Consumer Cellular are worth noting, even if its user base is older than the norm. 

“Consumer Cellular continues to dominate customer perception scoring by offering a supremely simplistic service that truly resonates with its customer base,” he says. “And while not all customers fit into that demographic, brands can learn a thing or two about how easy Consumer Cellular makes it to conduct business with them — from the explanation of the service to the simple user interface of their website.”

Cricket, the prepaid wireless provider now owned by AT&T, gets the highest marks for its in-store service, an area Market Force says deserves more attention as wireless technology gets more complicated and customers need more hands-on help. “Cricket is the clear leader across the board, ranking first in nearly every in-store service category, from clearly explaining products and providing information, to taking time with customers and proficiently setting up features,” the report says.

“In our research, we have seen that brands can truly damage their reputation when customer service representatives do an inadequate job of explaining the nature of the bill that a customer will receive in the first month,” Christian says. 

Those first bills with surprise charges create a lasting memory. 

“We have seen that this disconnect in the early stages of the customer relationship as being a strong detriment to overall satisfaction levels with new customers, he says.  “In some cases, it is the #1 predictor of customer churn.”