Consumers Dissatisfied With eCommerce Transactions, Customer Service

According to a consumer survey sponsored by Tealeaf, consumers are frustrated with issues regarding e-commerce websites. The survey was conducted by Harris Interactive. The findings revealed that 9 out of 10 consumers (87 percent) using e-commerce for business transactions experienced problems for the third consecutive year. 42 percent of these consumers have either stopped an online transaction or changed their online transactions to a competitor. 52 percent, as a result of an online issue, have stopped using e-commerce with the company.

Forrester Research estimates that 2007 retail sales conducted online were $157.4 billion. They expect the number of online retail sales to grow to $271.6 billion by the year 2011, which is 9% of overall retail sales. This information was reported in their survey entitled 'US Retail eCommerce Forecast".

CEO of Tealeaf, Rebecca Ward, says that consumers using e-commerce are no longer willing to put up with bad online experiences that don't live up to their expectations.

Shopping behavior has radically changed as a result of online companies that have lowered costs.

53 percent of online consumers with online issues said that they would contact customer service. Of these individuals nearly half (49%) said their issues were not resolved. 68 of these consumers felt that the customer service agent wasn't knowledgeable enough with regards to the company's website. 70 percent didn't think the customer service agent understood their issue.

Inadequate customer service from a company's service center has resulted in major business impacts such as 52 percent of online consumers abandoning their business transactions with those companies. 76 percent stopped doing e-commerce entirely.

The abandonment risk is affecting consumers who are trying to remain loyal to the companies they've done e-commerce with, according to Ward. In addition, Ward says that service centers lack the visibility to sufficiently address customer's concerns.