The International Customer Service Institute (TICSI) has launched a free online customer service self assessment and reporting solution. The online self assessment tool will be made accessible to all organisations that are committed to customer service improvement. This self assessment tool provides organisations with an overview of how they are performing against the requirements of The International Customer Service Standard (TICSS) and helps organisations identify their strengths and weaknesses in the field of service quality.
Ethos Consultancy is a Territory Franchise Partner for TICSI in the Middle East. Territory Franchise Partners (TFPs) are holders of a geographic TICSI franchise. TICSI franchise partners contribute to the development and revision of The International Customer Service Standard (TICSS), lead the implementation and certification processes of TICSS within their assigned territory and provide strategy development consultancy for customer service excellence.
The self assessment tool, which is freely accessible at www.TICSI.org, takes 15 minutes to complete and provides real-time reporting on how the participating organisation's current customer service is performing. Founder and member of the Strategic Advisory Board, Robert Keay, stated 'TICSI's Customer Service Self Assessment tool allows organisations to review their customer service performance, identify areas of improvement and prepare an action plan to address any gaps preventing them from delivering customer service excellence'. The fact that self assessment is totally free underlines the commitment of TICSI to the development of best practices in international customer service. Keay continued by adding 'the field of customer service has received a lot of attention over the last 12 months, the global recession has pushed customer service to the forefront of organisational strategy, and if excellence is to be achieved, organisations need to perform regular assessments in order to address service inconsistency and monitor progress'.
Self assessment is based on the requirements of The International Customer Service Standard (TICSS), which is the only customer service standard in the world. The aim of TICSS is to enable organisations to focus their attention on delivery of excellence in service quality while at the same time providing recognition of success through a formal third party certification scheme.
TICSS is based on the 5P's Service Quality Model which was developed by Philip Forrest, who is a co-founder and strategic advisor to TICSI, following a research program at Brunel University, London. The Model promotes five main areas of service delivery that have direct impact on customer satisfaction: Policies, Processes, People, Product/Services and Premises.
In November 2009, The International Customer Service Institute will launch its International Customer Service Benchmarking Index. The benchmarking index will provide organisations with a comparative analysis on where they stand in terms of customer service in global and local markets and will offer opportunities for best practice in customer service sharing and learning. Keay stressed that 'benchmarking is the practice of being humble enough to admit that someone else is better at something and being wise enough to learn how to match or even surpass them at it. Keay continued by adding, 'An integral part of improving organisational service quality performance is to be able to benchmark your customer service with local and international organisations and share best practices'
Take TICSI's online customer service self assessment now.
