Amazon tops US online customer satisfaction

SAN FRANCISCO - A latest survey released on Thursday showed Amazon, an American multinational electronic commerce company, leads in holiday customer satisfaction among US top Internet retailers while Apple hits four-year low in the study.

According to customer experience analytics firm Forsee, Seattle- based Amazon remains at the head in its annual Holiday E-Retail Satisfaction Index, scoring 88 on a 100-point scale. Apple's online retail store got a score of 80 and is out of the top five entirely, registering its lowest score in four years.

The annual survey, first released eight years ago, is based on more than 24,000 customer surveys in the United States during the prime holiday shopping season between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

"This year, we're seeing that even some of the largest companies in the country are at risk if they lose sight of customer satisfaction," Larry Freed, ForeSee president and chief executive officer, said in a statement.

"Satisfaction with the customer experience, when measured correctly, is the most important predictor of future success, and while Amazon clearly gets it, Apple stumbles from their usual focus on the customer experience," Freed added.

Apple ousted Ron Johnson as senior vice president of retail in October, only six months after he took up the post. During his brief tenure at Apple, Johnson made some unpopular changes at Apple retail stores, such as cutting staffing levels and firing newly recruited employees, which is reported to have negative effects on Apple store morale.

Also on Thursday, while touting its performance in customer satisfaction, Amazon announced that 2012 was its biggest holiday ever with over 26.5 million items ordered worldwide on its peak day, which is a record-breaking 306 items ordered per second.

"We are grateful to customers for once again ranking us at the top of the ForeSee customer satisfaction survey and for choosing to shop at Amazon this holiday," said Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com.