J.D. Power and Associates released their 2009 Canadian Wireless Customer Satisfaction Study today, and I found the results quite interesting.
Not surprisingly Virgin Mobile took the award in Post and Pre-paid wireless service. We’ve had my wife’s account with them for a few years now and I’ve got nothing to complain about.
It wasn’t much of a surprise either to see Apple’s iPhone take the smart phone award but I was a bit shocked that RIM’s Blackberry wasn’t riding up Apple’s ass and honking to pass! In fact no one came close; but I was happy to see that Nokia was in second place since I’ve always been fond of their phones.
I think the most important thing the article says is “The anticipation of new entrants into the Canadian wireless market has led consumers to develop more of a ‘wait and see’ mentality.”
I believe that’s fundamentally true, and coupled with the anticipation of season specials a lot of people probably held back their third quarter (July, August & September) purchases – normally a busy season as kids go back to school – but I think the fourth quarter will make up for it. I’m not sure a lot of people are going to wait until all the new entrants get up and running – they’re going to look at what Public Mobile, WIND, DAVE and Globalive have posted on their web sites and make their decision to either commit or keep waiting – but that patience will only last so long and a couple sweet deals from an incumbent could be disaster for a new entrant with a slow roll-out.
Cross-posted on Cameron-Schultz at J.D. Power and Associates 2009 Canadian Wireless Customer Satisfaction Study