Pitney Bowes, with total revenue of over $1,800,000 in 1985, manufactures, markets and services products in the business equipment and retail systems and fields. The company's products include mailing and shipping equipment, copiers, dictating systems, facsimile products, price marking and merchandise identification systems and supplies, business and computer supplies and financial services. It has manufacturing facilities in the U.S., U.K, Germany, Canada, Brazil, Mexico, Australia, Belgium, Switzerland and Singapore. At the end of 1985, the company had 28,995 employees of which 23,189 were in the U.S.


If your business purchases mailing equipment, postage meters or copier machines from Pitney Bowes, one of the world's largest suppliers, don't be surprised if you get a telephone call from one of the company's officers. No, he hasn't dialed a wrong number; he's just interested in finding out how customers perceive the company and its products and services.

"We want to get everyone in the company involved in satisfying our customers, even those in the 'ivory tower,'" says Gerry Lenk, vice president of quality at the Pitney Bowes headquarters in Stamford, Conn. That means that once a month, one officer in each division of the company's headquarters calls two customers who have been selected randomly from the over one million customers in the U. S. To Pitney Bowes, it's the customer who's the "boss."

"We want to fulfill the requirements our customers have of us," says Lenk. "So we ask them what our strengths and weaknesses are, where we can improve and how we are improving."

Telephone calls are not the only way Pitney Bowes measures customer satisfaction. The primary way is through a direct-mail questionnaire. The purpose of the questionnaire is to ask customers their experience with the company's sales personnel, product delivery, product features, product reliability, service experience, fairness of its prices, the billing system and Pitney Bowes overall.

Thousands surveyed

Every six months, 6,000 customers, half of them copy machine users, half of them mailing machine users, are sent the questionnaire. These customers are selected off the renewal billing file and are selected randomly from the total customer base. A cover letter explaining the survey and signed by Lenk accompanies it. Lenk says the letter personalizes the approach and lets people know there's really a person, rather than an anonymous department, behind the project.

Lenk goes one step further in personalizing the process. On the last page of the questionnaire, customers are invited to write additional comments about their perceptions of the company's products and services. Of the 20 % who return the questionnaire, Lenk says 60% of them will write additional comments. Lenk reads all of these comments and will call customers if they're having any type of problem with the product or service they've received.

"Sometimes customers will write if they're irritated about something, for example, if they haven't received a manual with their copy machine," says Lenk. "I'll make sure to call them and to send out a manual."

Distributing results

After the results have been tabulated and levels of satisfaction have been measured in each of the eight areas covered in the questionnaire, Lenk gives an oral presentation of the findings. The president of Pitney Bowes and vice presidents within each division of the company receive the results. From there, 18 regional vice presidents are informed of the company's product and service performance measurements within their particular location.

Lenk says the results are used to "drive improvement throughout the company." One area which has dramatically improved has been Pitney Bowes' service response time. When the first survey was mailed in December, 1985, customers stated that they were less than satisfied with the length of time it took a machine repair person to respond to service request. This prompted Pitney Bowes to implement ACCESS, a computerized dispatch system. Its purpose is to serve as an information base so that the company can better meet customer needs. Through ACCESS, customers throughout all 99 branch office areas can get immediate assistance with scheduling timely equipment service. Since Jan. 1, 1986, when ACCESS became available, the company has cut in half the time it takes a customer to get service after they have called. In addition to improving service responsiveness, ACCESS has also helped, Pitney Bowes provide the appropriate spare machine parts to its service organization.

Another area being improved is the company's billing system. As a result of better understanding customer perceptions, major investments are being made in computers, software and training to assure the billing system meets customer needs.

These improvements are big steps toward the company's ultimate goal: providing the highest level of customer satisfaction in the industry. They are steps realized through the help of a direct-mail survey.

"The survey has not only helped us communicate better with our clients but given us a clearer understanding of them," says Lenk. "It's those key elements which make our company a worldwide competitive business.