Re: United by telco animosity by Chris Koentges
Marketingmag.ca, Jan. 15, 2013
I’d like to let Chris Koentges in on a little secret. We know we’re not perfect at Telus – far from it.
That said, his recent negative diatribe in Marketing– which called out Telus as part of his larger effort to bash incumbent telecom carriers by citing as many negative things as possible without logical connection, context or balance – failed miserably in providing readers with a current and accurate impression of the progress Telus has made on the customer experience front.
I learned a long time ago in this business that the sun doesn’t shine every day. I’ve also realized that before you jump up and down screaming that you don’t like what someone said or wrote about you, best to first take a genuine look in the mirror.
Looking in the mirror and listening more than ever to what our customers and others are saying is exactly what Telus has been up to for the past few years. This very real effort has led to a number of friendly policy changes and improved service levels for our customers.
Let’s get to the facts.
Telus was the first major carrier to eliminate activation fees in 2012, along with dramatically simplifying our entire fee schedule. This move built on a series of improvements made over the past several years where Telus eliminated carrier 911 and system access fees for all new rate plans, made caller ID and voicemail standard on all rate plans, simplified our device pricing with “Anytime Upgrades” and revolutionized mobility contracts by introducing a fair “device balance” instead of the disliked contract termination fee. Each change was adopted based on customer feedback.
In 2010, it was Telus that proactively renegotiated international roaming rates with more than 500 wireless carriers around the world, allowing us to reduce data roaming charges by up to 60% for our customers. In 2011 we reduced our data rates to European destinations by a further 50%. Our customers now enjoy some of the lowest rates in the world for mobile voice and data use.
Our customers and other industry experts have started to recognize Telus for being different than our competitors and for the significant improvements that we’ve made in our service.
Telus was recently recognized by MobileSyrup readers for providing the best overall customer experience in 2012. In the most recent study by J.D. Power and Associates, Telus was ranked as having the second most “satisfied” wireless customers in
Canada in the full-service category. While we narrowly lost out to SaskTel (congrats to them), we were in fact the number one rated national carrier in the category.
And importantly, the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services’ (CCTS) Annual Report revealed that complaints this past year were up by 35% across the telecom industry, yet the number of complaints about Telus was down 13%.
We don’t need or expect a pat on the back from Mr. Koentges or Marketing. We know we still have a lot of work to do. But his over-the-top rant completely mis-represented or ignored the substance of the many good things Telus has done, how much we care about our customers, and, ironically, what Telus’ “marketing” strategy is all about.
The truth is customer experience is a massive priority for Telus – that’s not corporate rhetoric, it’s real.
Regards,
Nick Culo,
Vice-President, Corporate Communications
Telus
