Kirk Parsons Carriers Quotations

Given the number of major changes consumers have experienced over the past couple of years, the gap between customer expectations and actual service experience tends to widen as uncertainty from mergers greatly influences consumer perceptions. Case in point is the impact major market dynamics plays in future switching intent. Between 2004 and 2005, there has been a 5 percent increase in the intent to switch wireless carriers in the next 12 months -- a reverse from the past two years, where future switching intent remained stable.

It is clear that carriers need to manage their network to reflect their specific customer's usage patterns in order to provide the best possible call quality experience.

It's clear that wireless providers have made great strides in improving the quality of calls, especially in those areas that impact customer churn the most, such as calls that are dropped or disconnected. With an increasingly competitive environment and an increase in the number of services used in conjunction with a cell phone, carriers that offer superior network quality will improve their likelihood of attracting new customers and will increase customer retention. In fact, improving network quality is a beneficial financial incentive for wireless carriers, as customers experiencing at least one call quality problem are three times more likely to indicate they 'definitely will' switch carriers in the future.