CUSTOMER SUPPORT QUALITY AUDIT – ONLINE CASINO

Q3 -2013

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INTRODUCTION

This benchmark report assesses the quality of English customer service provided by online casinos. With the customer service team being one of the

most visible touch points an operator has, it is imperative that they appropriately represent the brand. Negative experiences with a support team are

often shared throughout social circles, with technology continuously increasing the reach such detrimental exposure can have. It is crucial therefore to

not only provide the service, but to provide it to a sufficiently high quality.

Despite many operators having publicly committed themselves to providing an exemplary customer experience, the previous benchmarks have indicated

that there is still work to be done. Often this is related to the difficulties associated with large scale operations, where personal and friendly service

becomes secondary to maximising efficiency. There are operators who have successfully incorporated service excellence into their culture; however the

majority continue to regard this critical touch point solely as a cost driver. As long as this perception persists, the revenues lost through unnecessary

churn and negative PR will continue.

The report examines in detail both the level of product knowledge the various teams have and how they approach providing a friendly and personal

service.

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METHODOLOGY

Each assessed operator had multiple new consumers sign up to their service and ask questions of varying complexity and difficulty, designed to identify

trends in consumer experience and resolution technique. The assessment is performed in English and covers a broad range of quality of service metrics

and accessibility evaluations.

The scoring model uses a tiered system, as shown in the image below, with groups of bottom level sub-category scores combining to create the mid-level

category scores, which in turn are used to generate the final score for each participant.

Where no response was received to a query, a score of 0 was applied. Each category and sub-category is assigned a percentage weighting that

represents how much influence it exerts on the overall score.

LIMITATIONS

This benchmark only assesses the English language support for new users to the online casino vertical. Many organizations have dedicated support for

different languages, additional product verticals or for VIPs specifically, which are not assessed in this analysis however can be done on request.

For the purposes of the benchmark we have included a selection of operators from various software providers and included a combination of casino-only

and multi-vertical operators to ensure we cover the majority of different business structures offering casino product services in our industry.

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SUPPORT QUALITY AUDIT – CASINO Q3 2013

OVERALL RESULTS

OPERATOR OVERALL ACCESSIBILITY RESPONSE

TIME PRODUCT

KNOWLEDGE PRESENTATION PERSONALISATION FRIENDLINESS

EXTRA

MILE

32RED 8.1 7.4 7.8 7.7 7.9 8.4 7.2 1.7

BET365 7.7 7.2 6.2 7.7 7.5 7.6 7.7 1.7

INTERCASINO 7.6 5.8 8.7 7.6 6.6 7.9 6.6 1.3

MRGREEN 7.3 4.4 7.9 7.3 7.8 8.0 7.0 0.8

LADBROKES 7.3 7.4 5.3 7.3 8.0 8.2 6.7 1.0

BETFAIR 7.1 6.1 3.6 7.5 8.4 8.5 6.8 1.7

888CASINO 7.1 6.7 2.7 7.6 7.5 8.2 7.8 1.7

BETSSON 7.0 6.7 6.2 6.9 7.0 7.7 6.0 1.4

GALA 7.0 6.5 5.1 6.7 8.6 8.1 6.1 1.4

WILLIAM HILL 6.9 7.1 4.3 7.5 8.4 7.7 6.5 0.4

PARTY CASINO 6.7 6.3 4.0 7.4 8.0 7.5 6.4 0.5

UNIBET 6.7 6.5 4.7 7.1 7.2 7.2 5.9 1.4

NETBET 6.7 6.5 2.5 7.6 7.6 8.5 6.8 0.6

PADDYPOWER 6.6 7.4 6.2 6.6 6.3 6.9 5.4 0.7

CLUBWORLD 6.6 7.0 6.0 6.4 7.0 7.3 5.3 0.6

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RESULTS BREAKDOWN

The next sections of the document will present the results of each of the seven top tier categories that were scored for each casino operator in the

assessment. They will include commentary and observations identifying trends within the data.

The seven categories, in order of presentation, are:

Accessibility

Response Times

Product Knowledge

Presentation

Personalisation

Friendliness

Extra Mile

Each of the above categories and their respective sub-categories have been thoroughly analysed for each operator independently in order to identify the

key areas where improvement potential exists. This data was then assessed from a top-level view to produce observations on the results data as a

whole, with breakdowns for each category and relevant examples lifted directly from the testing.

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1A. ACCESSIBILITY BREAKDOWN

Accessibility examines how easily a customer can contact the support team. This covers which communication mediums are supported, such as live chat,

email and telephone. It also includes the coverage that is provided, such as 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

It examines the following sub-categories:

Channels supported

Advertised Availability

Website FAQ

The Channels Supported sub-category covers the communication mediums that are supported, such as live chat, email and telephone, whilst the

Advertised Availability sub-category looks at whether the service is offered “24/7” or has limited hours.

Website FAQ performs a high level examination of the FAQ or knowledge base on the site, if one exists. We look at it from an ease of use perspective

and evaluate how easy it is to navigate and understand based on the design, as well how comprehensive the information is. For the purposes of this

report, games rules are only considered to be one part of a value adding self-help section and search functionality is also taken into consideration.

On the next page is the breakdown of scores across the three Accessibility sub-categories:

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ACCESSIBILITY RESULTS – TABULATED

OPERATOR OVERALL CHANNELS

SUPPORTED ADVERTISED

AVAILABILITY FAQ

LADBROKES 7.4 7.5 10.0 9.0

PADDYPOWER 7.4 8.5 10.0 7.0

32RED 7.4 9.0 10.0 6.0

BET365 7.2 8.0 10.0 7.0

WILLIAM HILL 7.1 7.0 10.0 8.0

CLUBWORLD 7.0 8.0 10.0 6.0

888CASINO 6.7 5.5 10.0 9.0

BETSSON 6.7 6.5 10.0 7.0

UNIBET 6.5 6.5 10.0 6.0

NETBET 6.5 7.0 10.0 5.0

GALA 6.5 7.0 10.0 5.0

PARTY CASINO 6.3 6.5 10.0 5.0

BETFAIR 6.1 8.0 5.0 9.0

INTERCASINO 5.8 5.0 10.0 5.0

MRGREEN 4.4 6.5 5.0 3.0

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1B. ACCESSIBILITY RESULTS

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1C. ACCESSIBILITY OBSERVATIONS

Below are some observations on the results for this category and sub-categories:

The FAQ sub-category makes a top level evaluation of the knowledge base and/or self-help sections of the operator’s website. Well designed and

informative self-help sections can provide a number of benefits, such as decreased incoming query volumes and a powerful knowledge repository for

your support staff to utilise.

There were two key observations to come out of this category:

A number of operators still only offer live chat to players on deposit related pages.

Whilst the majority of operators appear to have embraced live chat as an effective method of providing support, there are still operators who have the

capabilities but still only offer it in specific, deposit related circumstances. For the purposes of this benchmark, they have been considered as offering the

channel; however the quality of support is typically inferior to those who offer it as a genuine channel for seeking assistance. It was observed that these

operators use the channel to drive deposits to the exclusion of almost everything else. This led to such negative experiences as representatives cutting

off our mystery shoppers as soon they understood that they were looking for holistic support and not specifically to put money on their account. This left

the shoppers with a distinctly negative impression of the encounter, as the agent’s agenda was both transparent and perceived to be disrespectful.

Larger, multiproduct operators continue to have superior self-help and FAQ sections.

Self-help pages are an effective method for eliminating customer waiting times and reducing inbound volumes. These sections of the websites are often

undervalued; however they are essential for effective scaling because of the relatively low cost of implementation versus the high value added through

volume reductions and a superior customer experience.

At all times, on the website and through the support teams the customer should be shown the quality of the service they will receive. With technology

making it easier to provide intuitive and comprehensive knowledge resources, consumers expectations are naturally higher and if these prospective

customers see little other than obvious marketing materials or a poor executed attempt to provide a useful resource, then they may look to a competitor

who has made a greater effort to proactively meet their needs.

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2A. EMAIL RESPONSE TIMES

This category examines the speed of email responses from the various support teams. It has been moderately weighted and falls between Product

Knowledge & Accessibility in terms of the impact it has on the overall score. Whilst response times are very important for keeping customer satisfaction

high, we have weighted it as marginally less important than being knowledgeable about the product they are supporting and being contactable by the

customer. All queries came from either unregistered customers or newly registered customers from Sweden. It does not include instant contact channels

such as live chat, but assesses only email communication, which all operators use.

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2B. EMAIL RESPONSE TIMES OBSERVATIONS

A broad spread of results were seen in this category, with some responses taking less than 10 minutes and others more than 2 days, with some never

being responded to at all. For the purposes of the benchmark, we have assumed that faster response times are better, without any considerations as to

the impact on the quality of the answers or the potentially diminishing returns of improving the response time beyond the average.

Many of the operators also offer a live chat or telephone service to complement the email channel, which could be considered to diminish the

importance of rapid response times via email. Some operators however offered the instant contact channel only to existing members or in specific

circumstances.

The results for response times were diverse and did not highlight any consistent trends in the industry. The fastest and slowest operators in terms of

response times obtained the joint second best overall Product Knowledge score, whereas the lowest quality responses were received within the midfield

of the response times.

The average response time overall was between 8 – 24 hours from the time the email was sent to support until the time the response was received. This

does not include system generated auto-replies. The operator with the fastest response times replied to 95% of the correspondence within 60 minutes,

while the operator with the slowest response times replied to 60% within 1 to 2 days. Another operator took over 2 days to respond to 40% of the

emails. The two operators with the greatest amount of no replies failed to provide a response for 20% and 15% respectively. Not responding to

customers or answering too slowly is highly likely to have a negative impact on the customer experience and perception of the brand.

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3A. PRODUCT KNOWLEDGE BREAKDOWN

This category evaluates the level of product knowledge held by the support representatives. It covers multiple areas and is the most heavily weighted

category. Providing the answers to questions related to the product offering is one of the core functions of a support team. If the support team are

unable to answer queries relating to their own product then it would not instil confidence in the customer, which a well answered query can. The data

for this category comes from both live chat and email based communication.

It covers:

Games

Account Management & Security

Financial

Client Features

Promotions

Technical

Each of the sub-categories is scored on “Accuracy” and “Completeness”. The first examines how factually correct the answer provided by the

representative is. Lapses in accuracy can be costly, largely due to the potential impact of the customer being given the wrong information.

“Completeness” looks at how comprehensive the answers are and if all points of the query have been addressed. It is an important consideration due to

the benefits of resolving queries in the first instance and positively impacting the customer experience.

The Games sub-category assesses the level of knowledge related to available game types and formats, including questions related to the availability of

multi-player slots, where the game rules can be located, as well as information about payout /RTP’s. The Account Management & Security sub-category

looks at the level of knowledge relating to security, profile settings and responsible gaming, such as whether it is legal to play in the country of residence

or when going on holiday, inactive account fees and how to keep the account secure.

The Financial sub-category evaluates how knowledgeable the representative is with regards to depositing, withdrawing and payment method related

questions. Client Features probes the representative’s knowledge on the casino software and its features, such as saving favourite games, turning off

sounds and animations and how to access the game history.

Promotions examines how well the representative knows the currently running and future promotions at the room, including the VIP program, sign up

and deposit bonuses and their requirements. Technical assesses the representative’s ability to answer technical questions related to software security,

the required computer specifications to be able to download the software and playing from the same IP address with a friend.

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3B. PRODUCT KNOWLEDGE RESULTS – TABULATED

OPERATOR OVERALL GAMES ACCOUNT

MANAGEMENT FINANCIAL

CLIENT

FEATURE PROMOTIONS TECHNICAL

32RED 7.7 7.3 8.4 8.2 7.9 6.6 8.5

BET365 7.7 6.5 7.1 8.4 7.7 7.9 8.2

INTERCASINO 7.6 7.0 7.4 8.5 8.5 7.0 7.1

888CASINO 7.6 6.4 8.5 8.2 7.9 6.6 7.9

NETBET 7.6 7.3 7.9 7.6 8.2 6.7 8.3

WILLIAM HILL 7.5 6.1 7.4 8.3 8.0 7.1 7.8

BETFAIR 7.5 6.6 8.5 7.4 7.1 6.9 8.5

PARTY CASINO 7.4 7.8 7.7 6.9 7.1 8.0 6.9

LADBROKES 7.3 7.3 8.1 6.6 7.2 7.3 7.9

MRGREEN 7.3 6.6 7.4 8.3 8.2 5.7 8.2

UNIBET 7.1 5.5 8.0 8.0 6.2 6.2 8.2

BETSSON 6.9 6.8 8.3 5.4 6.4 7.0 8.1

GALA 6.7 5.6 8.2 8.1 6.7 5.6 5.1

PADDYPOWER 6.6 6.1 8.1 7.0 6.5 5.9 5.4

CLUBWORLD 6.4 5.2 7.4 5.8 6.7 6.1 7.6

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PRODUCT KNOWLEDGE RESULTS

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3C. PRODUCT KNOWLEDGE OBSERVATIONS

This category evaluates the quality of the responses received when specific types of product related queries are being asked. Below we make some

observations on the data:

Many operators still have significant opportunities to improve their first time resolution rate.

It has been observed that it is common in iGaming companies for multiple part queries to have questions left unanswered or acknowledged. It was also

seen from certain operators that unregistered players would receive a reply asking them to provide their account details or to resend the query from

their registered email address, even when the query was generic and not related to their account. When queries were answered, the level of detail

provided was generally of a good standard throughout the industry. However often minimalistic or partial answers were given that did not fully resolve

the query.

On some occasions the chat support team was perceived to be lacking in knowledge in comparison to their email counterparts, although this may be

related to service level expectation differences. This led to a number of referrals to specialists for the casino product, despite the questions not being

particularly complex. This suggests that at some operators, knowledge silos still exist and it was observed that this had a detrimental impact on the

ability of the support teams to fully resolve queries coming in.

The quality of information provided by most operators was inconsistent.

One trend that was identified was our mystery shoppers being provided with inaccurate information by various operators, often contradicting their own

terms and conditions. The importance of the support staff being well versed in the product they are offering cannot be understated, as communications

relating to these topics are often an issue that is preventing the customer from playing, detracting from their customer experience or stopping them

from depositing and becoming a real money player.

In the circumstances where incorrect information is provided, the ramifications for the player can be significant and result in both negative brand

exposures as the misinformed player vents their frustration in their social circles and consequently moving to a competitor for a better service.

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4A. PRESENTATION BREAKDOWN

This category assesses the quality of presentation in all communication with the support teams. It looks at the quality of language and grammar used by

the support representatives, as well as the impact of the formatting on the readability and presentation of the communication.

The two sub-categories that are covered are:

Language Quality

Formatting

The Formatting sub-category evaluates how the chosen formatting has impacted on the customer’s ability to read and understand the communication.

The Language Quality sub-category looks at their use of grammar, spelling and punctuation and the impact it has on customers’ understanding of the

message and the information being conveyed. Both categories are weighted equally due their similar impact on the customer understanding or

perception of the communication.

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4B. PRESENTATION OVERALL RESULTS – TABULATED

OPERATOR OVERALL LANGUAGE QUALITY FORMATTING

GALA 8.6 8.5 8.6

BETFAIR 8.4 9.0 7.8

WILLIAM HILL 8.4 7.9 8.8

PARTY CASINO 8.0 7.5 8.5

LADBROKES 8.0 8.5 7.4

32RED 7.9 7.0 8.9

MRGREEN 7.8 7.6 8.1

NETBET 7.6 8.1 7.2

888CASINO 7.5 8.0 7.1

BET365 7.5 7.2 7.8

UNIBET 7.2 7.0 7.3

CLUBWORLD 7.0 6.6 7.4

BETSSON 7.0 7.3 6.7

INTERCASINO 6.6 6.3 6.9

PADDYPOWER 6.3 7.1 5.6

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PRESENTATION OVERALL RESULTS

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4C. PRESENTATION OBSERVATIONS

This section examines the current standard of presentation and the resulting impact it has on the support communication.

Presentation is an area where operators should not fall down and should always achieve strong scores, as it is a representation of their brand at the most

basic level. It is important to have clear communication, which is largely related to the representative’s language skills, as it impacts the first time

resolution numbers but more importantly, it has a significant impact on how the customer perceives the support that has been provided.

Many of us will have communicated with a support team in the past and received a garbled or otherwise hard to understand message back and become

frustrated. For new customers this can be the deciding factor in looking to a competitor or otherwise considering the support team inept. The

appearance of the communication also has a significant impact because it is such a basic requirement that customers expect it to be handled to a

minimum standard. The results indicate that many operators maintained high standards of both language and formatting, however some did not.

One operator had the contact details automatically entered at the bottom of the email, after the response, after a copy of our message and after all of

the system generated elements such as banners and adverts. Such placement is unlikely to be seen the customer, who knows what message they have

sent and don’t need to go to the bottom of the email.

Some operators were also impacted in this category because their responses contained a multitude of system generated elements, such as back office

information, which is irrelevant to the customer. Their often colourful formatting detracted from the content of the response, which is what the user is

interested in. Whilst relatively minor issues (which is reflected in the scores), it is clear that for some operators little thought had been given about what

the end user receives if it is relevant. Other issues included links that were wrongly hyperlinked and therefore led to error pages or html code being

included in the email body. Further common issues included extra line spaces which resulted in an inconsistent structure to the message.

It was noted that template answers were not widely used, despite being an effective method for improving the overall language quality and formatting

of customer support communications. However, it was also observed that even without the consistent use of templates, the language skills were

generally strong within most support teams, even for operators whose primary focus is not on the English speaking markets.

The methods for ensuring consistently high presentation quality varied greatly, yet the overall standard of presentation was high. Whilst presentation

definitely adds value in terms of the impact it has on the customer experience, it is the far more significant, detrimental impact of being poorly

presented which can serve as incentive to implement such standardisation processes as creating template libraries and fixing system generated

formatting issues.

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5A. PERSONALISATION BREAKDOWN

The Personalisation category was included to assess how tailored the responses of the customer support team are. It looks at:

Greeting & Sign Off

Template Usage

Personal Touch

The Greeting & Sign off sub-category is relatively lightly weighted due to the expectation that a correct greeting and sign off would be used as standard.

It has been included to penalise the instances where this does not occur or where either is inappropriate or detracts from the message being

communicated.

The use of templates is also evaluated for appropriateness and examines how well integrated they are into the normal flow of the text by the sub-

category Template Usage. Templates are a very useful tool for boosting the support team’s productivity and accuracy of their responses; however they

can appear impersonal unless used correctly.

Personal Touch analyses the extent of personalisation that a given piece of communication has. This can occur in various forms, though typically we

would expect such things as the use of the customer’s name and directly tying the answers to the customer’s query rather than referring to them in

abstract.

The breakdown of the sub-category results are presented on the next pages:

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5B. PERSONALISATION OVERALL RESULTS – TABULATED

OPERATOR OVERALL GREETING & SIGN OFF TEMPLATE USAGE PERSONAL TOUCH

NETBET 8.5 8.7 9.8 7.2

BETFAIR 8.5 9.7 9.7 6.8

32RED 8.4 8.6 10.0 7.0

888CASINO 8.2 9.0 9.0 7.2

LADBROKES 8.2 8.9 9.4 6.7

GALA 8.1 9.3 9.3 6.5

MRGREEN 8.0 7.8 9.6 6.6

INTERCASINO 7.9 8.6 8.9 6.6

WILLIAM HILL 7.7 8.4 9.3 6.0

BETSSON 7.7 7.5 9.0 6.6

BET365 7.6 8.8 8.2 6.6

PARTY CASINO 7.5 8.0 8.7 6.2

CLUBWORLD 7.3 8.0 8.7 5.8

UNIBET 7.2 8.0 8.1 6.0

PADDYPOWER 6.9 6.8 8.3 5.5

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PERSONALISATION RESULTS

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5C. PERSONALISATION OBSERVATIONS

In this section of the benchmark we evaluate the degree of personalisation observed in the communication from the support teams. We highlight

possible reasons for any patterns seen in the data.

During the benchmarking process we observed that the quality of the introductory and exit text varied. Two operators only used the customer’s name in

44% of the correspondence, demonstrating a lack of attention to detail in the majority of their contacts with their users. The chat conversations from

several operators did not include a professional sign off, such as offering further assistance or wishing a pleasant day. The chat sign off from one

operator requested feedback on the quality of service, in lieu of actually providing a friendly exit piece. Despite the purpose of such a process ostensibly

being to improve their service, the placement was not appropriate.

Such examples would only have a minimal impact on the customer experience; however these small influences spread over large volumes of customers

can become significant over time, especially when combined with other “small issues”.

Very few operators appeared to make heavy usage of template answers to common questions. Whilst this can be undesirable as templates can be seen

as lacking in personalisation, this can be offset if the representative is given the time to tailor it to the specific query. The trend of online customer

service functions moving towards quality over quantity performance metrics still carries the unavoidable burden of increased costs, which the intelligent

use of templates can help to offset, whilst also supporting the goal of having a consistently high standard of service.

On some occasions templates were used inappropriately; not offering any information to answer the query or otherwise not being tailored and

containing irrelevant information. From the perspective of the customer receiving such a reply, the impression is one of a lack of caring about what the

customer thinks about the communication, which is certainly not beneficial to the company.

One response included inappropriate and offensive internal information that should not have been sent to the customer: “Quick link to check the

Browser’s version quickly with players, most of them have no clue how to check or can’t be bothered finding the Help/About tab. http://www.browser-

version.com/”. Whilst this was obviously included in error, the lack of attention reflected very poorly on the support team.

Multi-product operators should also take care to prevent templates from other products being used without tailoring it, as it is confusing when the

response includes references to “*Company Name* Poker”, “poker client” or being referred to the bingo or poker website for further information. Small

issues once again, but ones which would definitely be noticed by the customer.

Support staff from several operators repeatedly failed to provide direct links to their website, despite them being far more familiar with the layout and

location of information than the customer. The customer should always be presented with directly and easily accessible information, so that little effort

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or a search of the website is not required. Providing a direct link should be part of the minimum standard of service, as customers expect it and a failure

to meet these basic expectations reflects poorly on the operator.

One customer received the following response: “With regards to the different products we have available on the site I would suggest browsing around

the site to aquaint yourself with the different games/slots available”. This lack of effort is closely linked to the relatively poor Extra Mile scores seen in

iGaming, since responses where the customer is told to find information for themselves after having requested it from the support team indicates that

either too heavy a focus is given to speed over quality and/or no genuine desire to help the customer.

The final observation from this category was that the majority of operators failed to react appropriately to information given to them about the player,

such as being newly registered, deposited or yet to sign up, but also about their concerns about playing at an online casino. All of these represent an

opportunity to start the process of creating player loyalty by offering a personalised service. If a prospective player is asking questions about the product

offering, then it should be recognised that this is a potential customer and the support representative should act accordingly. Such recognition and

subsequent action occurred relatively rarely however and is a widespread improvement opportunity.

Improvements in this area would likely result in corresponding improvements across all metrics as customers receive a more complete and effective

level of service.

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6A. FRIENDLINESS BREAKDOWN

This category scores the representative on how friendly they were perceived to be in their approach to resolving the query. All customers want their

query understood and their problems solved, but they also want to feel valued and welcome which is often conveyed in the choice of wording used and

use of manners. With consumer demands and expectations changing, it is often no longer enough to just be polite, especially in an industry where brand

loyalty is relatively low, as a friendly service can make the difference between staying with you or going to a competitor. A failure to be appropriately

mannered can be highly detrimental however.

We have broken this category into 2 separate sub-categories:

Empathy & Tonality

Etiquette & Manners

In Empathy & Tonality we look at how well the support representative is seen to be understanding and appreciating the customer’s situation. This is

often reflected in their perceived tone, the language used and their acknowledgement of emotional content.

For Etiquette & Manners we look at the use of such terms as “please” and “thank you” as well as the appropriateness of the response overall. The

correct use of manners and tone can convey a show of respect to the customer and a feeling that the query is being taken seriously and handled

professionally.

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6B. FRIENDLINESS RESULTS - TABULATED

OPERATOR OVERALL EMPATHY & TONALITY ETIQUETTE & MANNERS

888CASINO 7.8 7.7 8.0

BET365 7.7 7.3 8.2

32RED 7.2 7.0 7.4

MRGREEN 7.0 6.8 7.1

NETBET 6.8 6.2 7.8

BETFAIR 6.8 6.2 7.6

LADBROKES 6.7 6.2 7.4

INTERCASINO 6.6 6.0 7.5

WILLIAM HILL 6.5 6.2 6.9

PARTY CASINO 6.4 6.3 6.5

GALA 6.1 5.3 7.2

BETSSON 6.0 5.7 6.3

UNIBET 5.9 5.7 6.3

PADDYPOWER 5.4 5.3 5.4

CLUBWORLD 5.3 4.9 6.0

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FRIENDLINESS OVERALL RESULTS

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6C. FRIENDLINESS OBSERVATIONS

In this section we look at the results for the Friendliness category and sub-categories and make observations to highlight potential areas of improvement

or excellence.

With hard to measure qualitative metrics such as this, where the scenario the support team faces is almost always unique to the individual user, it is

difficult for operators to put in place any kind of standardisation to ensure consistent levels of friendliness. The impact, both positive and negative, of the

friendliness of a support team is highly significant however. The results seen in this assessment are similar to those seen in previous assessments, with

many support representatives being perceived to be more coldly professional than friendly, which is reflected in the scores. As this is the status quo

currently, an opportunity exists for operators who are consistently friendly to drive loyalty and word of mouth acquisitions.

The quality of the responses varied quite significantly across both child categories. The testing clearly indicated that many operators have processes in

place such as training or spot sampling of the support representative’s work to nurture the consistent use of the appropriate tone and use of manners,

however we also experienced incidents of impoliteness or impatience from multiple operators. This should never occur, even if faced with an angry

customer, which was not included in any of the scenarios in the assessment.

One example where improvements opportunities were apparent was in the following reply to a query about getting a deposit bonus: “No you cannot ask

for the bonus once deposit was already played, as deposit match only can be applied before you make the deposit”.

Whilst the response is technically accurate regarding the ability to apply a bonus after a deposit has been used for playing; the tone and language used

by the support team is noticeably lacking in any of kind sympathy about the customer missing out on the bonus. Customers cannot be expected to know

of the technical limitations that restrict bonuses being applied and such a denial should take this into consideration, as well addressing the likely

disappointment of the customer. Ideally in this situation, as well being more tactful, the operator would have attempted to offer some kind of

alternative, like a higher value deposit bonus for their second deposit or similar.

It was also observed that some operators made no attempt to be friendly, but instead have their representatives trained on just being polite. Whilst this

is never bad, it also does not have any significant on customer loyalty. A suitable comparison is the automated routing systems many phone support

teams use, which require you to answer a series of questions by selecting the right option by pressing the corresponding key. Research has shown that

customers want to deal with a person and the same applies to both live chat and email communication. Being polite is a necessity, but it rarely adds

value to the experience of the customer whereas personal, friendly engagement will and this can be hard to achieve where robotic politeness is the only

measured and encouraged quality metric.

CSQA | Q3 2013

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7A. EXTRA MILE BREAKDOWN

This category has been included to reward support teams who demonstrate that their foremost priority is helping the customer solve their queries. It is

only applied when a representative is seen to go above and beyond their normal duties to provide an excellent service. It is broken into two sub-

categories:

Extra, relevant information

Willingness to respond to off-topic

Extra, relevant information was applied when the representative was seen to be giving timely and relevant additional information on and around a

subject; however said information was not explicitly requested.

Willingness to respond to off-topic was included because it is often beneficial for customer engagement and the customer experience if a representative

is willing to engage in some off topic conversation with the customer. Whilst it does not support the efficiency of a support team, it does drive brand

loyalty and customer satisfaction when used appropriately.

With the increasing demographic range, diversity in brand awareness and product familiarity and the increase in likely support contacts arising as a

result, this category is becoming increasingly important to operators who wish to seize market share through differentiation. Within the Casino industry

there is very little differentiation on product offering alone, with almost all operators offering a similar selection of casino varieties and promotions. As a

result, there is a growing focus on optimising the customer experience as a means to stand apart from the competition and occurrences of “extra mile”

behaviour in support is one of the key methods that this can be achieved.

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7B. EXTRA MILE OVERALL RESULTS – TABULATED

OPERATOR OVERALL EXTRA, RELEVANT

INFORMATION WILLINGNESS TO

RESPOND OFF TOPIC 32RED 1.7 0.1 4.7

888CASINO 1.7 0.7 3.7

BETFAIR 1.7 0.2 4.5

BET365 1.7 1.5 2.0

BETSSON 1.4 0.0 4.0

UNIBET 1.4 0.1 3.7

GALA 1.4 0.3 3.4

INTERCASINO 1.3 0.2 3.4

LADBROKES 1.0 0.2 2.5

MRGREEN 0.8 0.2 1.8

PADDYPOWER 0.7 0.0 2.1

NETBET 0.6 0.0 1.8

CLUBWORLD 0.6 0.0 1.7

PARTY CASINO 0.5 0.1 1.2

WILLIAM HILL 0.4 0.0 1.2

CSQA | Q3 2013

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EXTRA MILE OVERALL RESULTS

CSQA | Q3 2013

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7C. EXTRA MILE OBSERVATIONS

Below are our observations on the results data for the bonus category.

It is clear from the results that there are many opportunities that still exist in regards to operators going the extra mile to provide exceptional service.

For the purposes of this assessment we were looking for representatives who did not simply provide the de facto answers, but instead seek to amaze the

customer with their genuine desire to provide the best support possible. It therefore incorporates all aspects of the communication, from the tone being

used and the impression this conveyed, through to the level of detail provided in the answers. Where representatives were seen to exceed expectations,

they would receive a score in this category.

The majority of representatives did not actively attempt to go further than was needed to address the word of the query. This is reflected in the scores

that were achieved; however there were a few support agents that did provide the user with relevant and useful additional information or willing to chat

informally. In one case the representative included a detailed “How to get started” guide with information about the bonuses, complementary points

and the VIP club. For a customer unfamiliar with the offer available at online casinos, this would have been appreciated which in turn increases the

likelihood of them being loyal to the brand. The majority of the scores obtained for giving extra, relevant information were related to promotions and

whilst it was deemed extra mile, it did not appear to be done with the intention of providing the customer with useful information, so much as a desire

to increase conversions and deposits. For this reason, minimal points were allocated for these instances.

The number of missed opportunities far outweighed the ones that were taken. One of the most widespread missed opportunities is related to the

personalisation categories, in that cues provided by the mystery shoppers were either missed or ignored. Examples of this include questions relating to

“new player bonuses” and “questions before signing up”. By including these in our communications were offering an opportunity to identify the new

player and provide appropriate information, such as software guides, information on loyalty programs or any other assistance that would benefit a new

customer.

Two operators in the assessment gave the impression that they discourage their representatives to engage in any off topic conversation, as the

representatives responded to some mystery shoppers trying to chat informally, with the response “We can only answer questions about the casino”. It is

possible it was the personal preference of the support representatives in question, however it occurred on more than one occasion for both opertors.

CSQA | Q3 2013

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CLOSING STATEMENT

The benchmarking process continues to highlight that there is room for further development in how we support our customers. Finding the correct

balance between reducing the cost of customer support and providing a service that drives brand loyalty is difficult, especially because it is difficult to

correlate friendliness to lifetime values. Below we look at the main observations to come out of the benchmark:

The quality of the self-help and FAQ sections still represent significant improvement opportunities for many operators.

In an online service industry it would be reasonable to expect that a provider’s online presence would be well designed and comprehensive in its

content, inclusive of their support pages. Examining the self-help sections on many operator sites has proven this to not be the case however. There are

many instances where this cost saving, customer facing section of the website is extremely underdeveloped, especially when compared to those who

have shouldered the investment and created a genuinely helpful area of their site.

The beneficial impact that these resources can have, in terms of providing knowledge bases for your employees and therefore increasing the quality and

consistency of their answers to customers, as well as reducing inbound volumes by empowering customers to solve their queries on their own, are

significant. These benefits increase significantly with corresponding increases in operation size and scale. A further advantage of having a good online

help section is being able to provide direct links to the customers so that they can read up on the information. This particularly helps chat support

representatives, who need access to information in real time. It was also noted that some operators do not have a payments page available with

depositing and withdrawal information, although this is an important topic for real money players.

Many operators still rely on formal politeness in lieu of a friendly service.

The benchmark has highlighted that many operators still consider friendliness a “nice to have” rather than a basic requirement. As technology increases our customer’s interconnectedness, this may negatively impact them as their competition rises above them in the public’s perception.

Providing friendly and empathetic assistance has a positive impact on the customer experience and therefore loyalty and brand perception. It is common sense that happy customers are more likely to recommend the brand to their friends and family, however the difficulties associated with implementing a “customer friendly” culture across a large business appear to have deterred the majority. This therefore represents an opportunity to stand apart for operators.

Extra Mile level of service was almost non-existent.

The results highlight that the occasions where operators went above and beyond the required level of service were extremely rate. With the Casino

product being high margin compared to other iGaming products such as Poker, it is surprising to see how little is returned to the customer in terms of

effort in creating a memorable support experience.

CSQA | Q3 2013

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A particularly noteworthy missed opportunity was when our mystery shoppers asked about a bonus after having played with some of the money they

had deposited, to which they were told they would get nothing essentially. No alternative was offered, nor any sympathy. It is unclear whether this poor

result was because the employees were not appropriately empowered to “rescue” such situations or if the culture at this operator was one of tightly

gripping the bottom line, even at the expense of customer satisfaction.

Interestingly, the amount of off-topic conversation was markedly higher than the occurrences of extra information being given. This suggests that for

many operators extra mile service is still considered an unrealistic aspiration and is therefore not encouraged or facilitated, which is a missed

opportunity.

CSQA | Q3 2013

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FUTURE BENCHMARKS

This report is the last edition in the current format. Each of the benchmarks that has been published was performed approximately 6 months ago, after

which the data is collated, analysed and these reports produced. This means that the data is approximately half a year old and may not reflect the

current operation.

All future benchmarks will be hosted online via a web portal, where subscribers will be able to access the data for all of the products they are interested

in. New data, consisting of benchmark scores, transcripts and our observations will be uploaded on a bi-weekly basis and will be visible to all subscribers.

The reduction in lead time before data is made available will increase the relevancy of the data and provide consistent feedback on the current

performance of your operation. It will also facilitate the accurate analysis of periods where service levels deviate from the standard.

We hope you have found this final edition of the report of interest and if you would like more information about what and whose data you will be able to

see on the upcoming web portal, please do not hesitate to contact us using the details below.

Email: David.Coleman@ixpconsulting.com

TELEPHONE: 00350 54594000