Coca Cola, ECG to be given ‘Worst Customer Service Award 2010’

A group calling itself The Ghana Customer Service Awards Team, which is made up of media and consumer protection advocates say it has selected Coca Cola and the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) for ‘The Worst Customer Service Awards 2010’. The award ceremony known as the 1st Ghana Customer Service Awards at which the companies will be named and shamed is due to be launched November 19, 2010 at the International Press Centre, Accra.

In a press release issued in Accra, the group also listed RVI Ghana, agents of RCI Options for the award it calls ‘Customer Exploitation Award 2010’. It however did not state the reasons for these name and shame awards.

It also said forty organisations which have been selected from the public and private sectors are to be honored with ‘Customer Leadership Awards’ based on what the team has observed as good customer, staff and community relations, a conducive working environment, telephone etiquette, promptness in reply of emails and letters, corporate social responsibility, and effective media relations. The group says it arrived at these conclusions based on research.

The group named some individuals, Alban Bagbin, the Minister of Works and Water Resources, and Yaw Kumey, the CEO of Y. Kumey International, a real estate company for special awards.

According to the group the awards are meant to set standards in customer service in Ghana, towards the attainment of a national customer service culture as the nation emerges as an oil economy and a preferred business and investment destination in Africa.

By Ben Boateng