A study on the satisfaction of customer towards counter service at Kedai Telekom Shah Alam: a case study in the area of Shah Alam, Selangor

Telekom Sales & Services Sendirian Berhad (TSSSB) was incepted in 1989, a wholly owned subsidiary of Telekom Malaysia, the country’s longest serving and premier telecommunications provider, started off as part of a campaign to enhance customer services. Under TSSSB, more than 90 Kedai Telekom stores strategically located throughout the country. Kedai Telekom playing a familiar role for the general public for service position, bill payment, bureau services and as a complaint center. Additionally, each Kedai Telekom outlet has been upgraded with retail counters and will undertake the direct sales activities as well as providing maintenance, support and after sales service. The company had received many types of complaints from the customers towards its service. For example, long time service at counter, where the customer have to wait for a long time in order to ensure the transaction to be settled, service could not be offer due to the technical problem or not enough staff to handle, information is not accurate and not up dated, queuing problem, unable to handle the customer’s problem efficiently especially at the counter. This problem may affect the company’s service quality and its prestige image. This research is done to determine: (1) the level of satisfaction of the customers towards Telekom Malaysia counter service, (2) to identify the problems that always being faced by the customer when dealing with counter service and (3) to identify the characteristics of an effective counter service that being expected by the customers. Primary and secondary data collections were used where the primary data was obtained from questionnaires and personal interview and secondary data were gathered from the published resources such as magazines, internet, books and also the journal. About 120 questionnaires were distributed among the customers of Telekom service in Shah Alam, Selangor. Only 80 of the respondents gave full cooperation in answering the questionnaire and were successful collected by the researcher. In determining the satisfaction level of the customers towards the service provided, the variables were categorized into two; effectiveness and efficiency. Majority of the respondents satisfied with the efficiencies and effectiveness of the services. However, feeling of dissatisfaction still occurred in certain aspect of services such as the ability of the staff in handling the customers’ problem and the clarity of the explanation given by the staff. Based on the respondent statement, the major problem that always being face by them is lacking of staff in handling many customers especially within peak hours which is lead to the queuing problem. To produce an effective counter service, most of the respondents suggest the Kedai Telekom have to provide an expert staff for which is knowledgeable serving them at the counter, and also need the courteous staff whom are good concentrate in more towards skill in interpersonal relationship such as communication skill and having good manner. In order to maintain and upgrade their company performance, Telekom Malaysia must focus on their customer service department especially in the counter service. It is because customer service most refers to the front line office like the Kedai Telekom. By this way, might improve their service performance and will satisfy their customers.