Customer service and satisfaction in the fashion retail industry: a human resources system to optimize big retailers, Middle East

Abstract

The fashion retail industry in the Middle East region is drastically expanding in most of the countries of the region with a great variety of international brands opening. The purpose of this thesis is to study the level of customer satisfaction in the region and try to design a complete training system to maximize customer satisfaction by optimizing customer service. Establishing such a system might be hard to design, yet succeeding in such initiative might allow retailers to gain an important competitive edge in times of sever competition and great expansion. The problem is that the customer service trainings are not yielding direct results and the belief is that this is due to the lack of a supporting system. A survey was conducted in order to identify the level of customer satisfaction in fashion retail in the Middle East along with the reasons behind these levels. The surveys allowed us to conclude that satisfaction levels are low due to the absence of certain competencies that are trainable. In addition to that, store visits and interviews with professionals in the field were conducted to understand why trainings aren’t yielding the expected results, what is the overall level of satisfaction during a regular fashion shopping experience, what are the major qualities that sales people commonly demonstrate during a shopping experience, and what are the approaches or behaviors that sales people are encouraged to demonstrate during a shopping experience in the country of residence? The outcomes showed that training alone is not yielding results, so it needs to be reinforced by a complete support system. I believe that the proposed system will provide a good solution to the problem mentioned and the satisfaction level will thus be increased.