Dec 3, 2007 : 1 and 1 Releases UK Consumer Study

📅 December 3, 2007 - UK Web hosting provider 1&1 Internet (1and1.co.uk) announced on Monday that it has released a report that shows that 83 percent of Britons have been negatively affected by being unable to find contact details from a business' website.


1&1 Internet spoke to approximately 1,300 UK consumers for its "Website Communication Survey" and found that the number one customer service gripe for 77 percent of respondents was the difficulty of finding a means to contact a business from its website, followed closely by being held in a telephone queue, dealing with heavy-accented staff, bad on-hold music and inflexible office hours.

The survey also found that real-time live dialogue with businesses using live-chat, forums or call-me-back facilities is in high demand, with 90 percent of consumers wanting this type of communication and one in three requiring it from the UK businesses they currently use. In contrast, a further survey of 260 British firms showed that 92 per cent did not currently provide these facilities on their websites and 42 per cent had no plans to do so in the future.

"Our research clearly shows that struggling to contact a business from its website is a major cause of concern for consumers," says Andreas Gauger, CEO of 1&1 Internet. "More of us than ever are using real-time online messaging in our everyday lives and consumers now place a high value on the ability to talk to businesses in this way. Britons benefit greatly from access to support in real time and both consumers and businesses have a lot to gain from developing better online relationships."

1&1 also recently launched a new line of eShop packages for its UK customers.