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SQA vs. SQA

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How important do you think, is Service Quality Assurance? How does it compare with the importance given to Software Quality Assurance in a product-service scenario?

Give me your views and if possible illustrate the same with your experience.

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by james r linn

But if I were to, I'd say that people underestimate the impact of service quality on customer satisfaction.

Its inevitable that even with the highest quality application, there will be some requirements for service, simply because we can't anticipate all the ways that someone will ever want to use a product.

So at some point customers will call. And their opinion of your product and your company will be coloured by how well it is supported.

I was often dissapointed by the technical support I received from some major companies, and at the same time, thrilled by the support and sense of partnership I got from working with some smaller ones.

So to achieve good service quality you have to hire the right people and have the right process goals and metrics.

And given that it costs many times more to get a new customer than to keep an existing one satisfied, thats only common sense.

James

by clinton goveas

Interesting observation, James, but why do you think large firms (generally) are unable to provide a high service quality level as compared to smaller firms?

Is it because they are LARGE & unwieldy? or because they simply lack corporate commitment?

by james r linn

For example, I recall that over a decade ago, Wordperfect had superb support - short waits, pleasant, effective and knowledgable agents and it was free. But they didn't get there overnight - they made a huge committment to be the best in tcehnical support, and kept on working at it.

Microsoft on the other hand, had in my mind very poor support 10 years ago. Typical answers were, restart the application, if that doesn't work, restart the PC, if that doesn't work reinstall the app, if that doesn't work reinstall the Os then the app.

I think its more of a market dynamics thing - many small companies have learned the lesson that its easier to keep a customer than to find a new one - whereas companies with monopolies or virtual monopolies tend to let service slide. The same is true with telecom and other non IT areas.

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