3
Census and sample surveys
This chapter is about the type of surveys used by firms who want to find out about the satisfaction level of their customers. We begin with a brief introduction on the importance of customer satisfaction surveys (CSSs) for a firm, and proceed to present the two main types of surveys, census and sample. The choice between the two depends on costs, timeliness, goals of the survey, and mainly on the type of firm, its dimension and its customers. For each survey, the quality of the data collected depends on different types of errors. We focus our attention on non-sampling errors in CSSs and discuss their effect on statistical estimates. Then we show various data collection methods applied in CSSs, linking every method to one or more non-sampling errors. Finally, some methods to correct these errors are suggested.
3.1 Introduction
The measurement of customer satisfaction can be direct or indirect. In the first case, customers are directly asked how satisfied they are; in the second case, satisfaction is measured as the difference between the perceived and expected satisfaction for each dimension. In the evaluation of customer satisfaction, information has to be collected directly from customers, since the performance of the service and its quality are perceived subjectively and may differ from an objective study of performance and quality. This information is usually gathered on a regular basis, in order to monitor ...
