Consumer survey slams securities, express delivery hotlines

Securities companies and express couriers rank rock-bottom for their customer service hotlines, according to a survey of service sector enterprises by the China Consumers Association.

The group said on Wednesday it had made 4,301 calls to hotlines operated by 47 companies across eight industries, including banking, insurance, telecommunications and transportation.

Ninety-eight percent of calls were answered within 10 seconds, with 54 percent answered within three seconds.

Less than 1 percent of calls went unanswered, including several made to branches of GF Securities in Changchun, Jilin province, and Nanchang, Jiangxi province.

No 1 in the rankings was China Insurance, where it took an average of 9.2 seconds for callers to reach a human operator.

The association said the hotlines for six express delivery companies all tested poorly for how long it took to speak to a human: STO (an average of 17.4 seconds), EMS (19 seconds), SF (19.9 seconds), ZTO (24 seconds), Shanghai YTO (27 seconds) and Yunda (39.4 seconds).

Bike-sharing companies Mobike and Bluegogo both performed well, but major player Ofo received a poor rating for problems that prevented customers speaking to a human.

The survey showed that 10 companies — including Air China, China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines and Hainan Airlines — offered English-language services.

However, the 12306 hotline for booking train tickets was available only in Chinese, it said. Network operator China Railway Corp declined to comment on the survey report when contacted on Wednesday.

The association also said some banking hotlines made it too complicated to modify passwords, while few companies provided customer services 24/7.