What is an acceptable Customer Complaint %?

G

Greg B

#1
Hi All,

I am doing an exercise for marketing. They feel that our Customer Complaints (CCs) have increased over the past two years and they are correct....but.... our dispatches have also increased (at a greater rate). Our CC's are running at approx 2% (2000 dispatches campared to 40 CCs).

What are your thoughts on this ?

I know you are going to ask what is the increase in orders vs CCs has been over thees years versus previous years, but I really want to know what an acceptable level is? (I know 0% would be good)

Greg B
 
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E

encee98

#2
Hi. I don't know if this counts, but are the nature of the complaints similar? What I mean is, are your dispatches correcting the same nature of complaints because if you do, then maybe you need to make corrective and preventive actions. I know this does not answer your question really, but I just got curious. I have this idea that CCs may be used as gauge in determining if we satisfied the customers or not; and if we didn't then we may need to correct something...

Best regards,

Naomi
 
G

Greg B

#3
encee98,

Yes we are correcting the issues and finding the root causes etc. The issues are not related and are across our entire customer range. The question really is, is 2% aceptable?

Greg B
 
#4
What is an acceptable level? Hard to say...

Greg B said:
The question really is, is 2% aceptable?
I'd say that you need more than one measurable here. Using only that one may lead you down the wrong alley.

From what you're saying I take it that your cc/dispatch ratio is going down. A positive trend can't be bad, and it would seem that your actions are effective.

On the other hand the number of CC's are going up, and every one represents a dissatisfied customer who couldn't care less if the above ratio is good. The number of complaints should be considered.

What about the financial impact? How much does the CC's affect your profit?

/Claes
 
G

Greg B

#5
Claes,

I agree with what you are saying and I do not usually crunch these type of numbers because they can be and usually are misleading (IMO).

Marketing think that there is a drastic increase in CCs. I say that there are also but other factors have to be taken into account such as the increased output. We have ramped up output by about 40% and the CCs have in actual fact gone down, as a percentage. Marketing just see the total number (morons) and I want them to see the whole picture which I wil give them on Friday but is 2% a good average? I have not seen a national or international study on the average complaints per company. I know this would be difficult as people see things differently but I thought I would plot it anyway.

I'll show the figures that show we are actually trending down but what I want from them in the future is a Risk analysis of how the CC affects the company both from an immediate dollar value and a risk to the customer and us (future purchases, next round cost increases etc).

I have been after these for years and I am still toget them.

Greg B
 
B

Bulksupplier

#6
Complaints - caution with targets

Just a word of caution here -
Are you 100% sure that you are capturing all customer complaints, or just those received formally in writing?
Our experience is that formal complaints represent only the tip of the iceberg. Customers usually make allowances for the odd supplier mistake, or don't even notice it. They only make a formal complaint when they suffer real inconvenience, or believe they can use it to lever down the price.
For example - we get our hauliers to report their actual delivery time at the customer. Using this data and counting how many complaints we get for late delivery, we find on average only 5% of lates result in a formal complaint. We therefore started logging all lates as nonconformances, and also capture concerns. The first result is a dramatic increase in 'complaints' - but from then on you can begin to make real improvements, with a real impact on customer satisfaction.
Incidently, our target for formal complaints is 1.5% of deliveries.
 

Howard Atkins

Forum Administrator
Staff member
Admin
#7
I heard that in FDA audits the first action is to check the number of complaints and compare this to a reference table, if you have to few then they start digging.
Maybe some one from this field can give some input.

This is similar to internal PPM levels, the numbers to compare just don't seem to be there.
I once asked about this in the field of hybrids and got no answer.

I think that people don't want to give numbers before they now an average and no one has an average cause no one gives numbers.
 

RoxaneB

Super Moderator
Super Moderator
#8
I hate to say this, Greg, but maybe there is no accepted number for Customer Complaints. We track complaints/ton for each of our four complaint types. Unfortunately, we can do nothing about the two types that are attributed to Sales...so we focus our energies on the remaining two types that are our responsiblity to address. We've noticed that here in the mill, we're getting better...wish we could say the same for Sales. The work we do is offset by what they don't do. :mad:

Obviously, the number of Customer Complaints you want is zero...but I remember on a Cost of Quality course I took a few years back, we discussed External Failure Costs. External Failures included Allowances, Warranty Charges, Returned Goods and Customer Complaints and the "accepted ratio" for External Failures for your Cost of (un)Quality is 20%-40%. (my brain is still having a hard time accepting that)
 
D

D.Scott

#9
Just my 2 cents worth here.

We base our ratio on CCRs/shipments and are typically below 1%. In regard to tracking numbers of CCRs, there are a number of pit-falls you need to watch out for. The "new" zero defects requirement has triggered a large number of CCRs which would, in the past, have been overlooked by the customer. Everybody in the automotive industry is scared to death they will send a defect to the OEM and be placed on a penalty containment. We are getting complaints on perceived problems that aren't even a requirement. A good example of what I mean here is - we put a sealer under the head of a fastener and a customer finds a part with a spot that isn't coated. The requirement is to coat 90% and the spot is well within acceptable limits. The complaint is now on the non-requirement that the customer doesn't like the look of this part and we need to stop leaving spots. My only point here is that the perception of a lot of customers has changed due to stress driven down the chain.

For the other side of the equation I have to go back to my grandfather who always said "be very afraid if you don't get complaints from your customer". If you dig a bit into what he meant you find a bit of logic. His theory was that the majority of "complaints" were not really more than contacts from your customer letting you know of an issue that has come up. They aren't saying they will stop doing business with you, they are letting you know they found an issue and you should fix it. If a customer called and said he found a flywheel in his bin of parts it isn't because he wants an 8-D, it is because he is letting you know he found it and maybe you would like to fix it. He doesn't assume he will get future flywheels. If you can accept that every complaint is not necessarily a complaint but a communication of a working partner, you had better pray your partner doesn't give up on the communication. The day he stops letting you know the little issues is probably the day he decided to buy from somebody else.

I guess what I'm saying is that a numerical analysis of complaints doesn't mean much without a real in-depth look at all the other things surrounding them. Sometimes they are up, sometimes down. Anybody ever notice the spike in minor complaints when business is slow? There is a definate drop in them when business is booming and everybody is busy.

Dave
 
C

Craig H.

#10
Howard Atkins said:
I heard that in FDA audits the first action is to check the number of complaints and compare this to a reference table, if you have to few then they start digging.
Maybe some one from this field can give some input.

This is similar to internal PPM levels, the numbers to compare just don't seem to be there.
I once asked about this in the field of hybrids and got no answer.

I think that people don't want to give numbers before they now an average and no one has an average cause no one gives numbers.
Howard: Yes, and that is why I have so many problems with the basic concept of six sigma and errors expressed as parts per million. This thread, to me, is similar in that respect: a percentage of errors versus what? Per million what? If there is a list of 3 parameters each item must meet, then are there only 3 chances for an error on that particular part? How do we count being (or not being) late on delivery? Does that mean we really have 4 parameters? Error in packaging (but not spec'ed) counts, or not?

We can answer these questions internally, for our own particular situation, and use those metrics to see if we are in statistical control, or improving (or not). But, unless the parts (of the million) and the errors definitions are the same, trying to directly compare one situation (company) with another is problematic, to say the least.

Your company's "error" may be my company's "opportunity for improvement". Same problem, different accounting.

As long as it works for us, so what?

JMHO

Craig
 
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