Improvement of customer satisfaction based on key quality indicators

Abstract

The objective of the thesis is to develop a new Quality Procedure based on Key Quality Indicator in order to improve customer satisfaction in the hydraulic cylinder section. Key Quality Indicator development procedure starts from a study of the company’s Quality policy in manufacturing of hydraulic cylinders. Then, define the factory department’s critical success factors based on quality policy and customer needs. The Quality Indicators is defined in accordance to the critical success factor. Finally, the Key Quality Indicators are selected. The selected Key Quality Indicators of Quality of Product and On-time Delivery have been deployed into the quality control procedure of the hydraulic cylinder manufacturing process with the purpose of increase in customer satisfaction form both aspects of Quality Indicators. After the implementation of two months, the efficiency of hydraulic cylinder manufacturing had been developed and customer satisfaction level improved. Results of customer survey shows that the mean rating of questionnaire increased from 3.24 to 3.60. Major improvements are quality of delivery time, quality of product, quality of design and company effort on improvement of product quality and delivery time. This supported that the company’s performance has been improved during the implementation period. Additionally, customer complaints in aspects of product quality and delivery time had been decreased from 40 per month in 4Q04 to 17 in Feb05 and from 31 per month in 4Q04 to 18 in Feb05 respectively. Therefore, the KQI deployment can assure the improvement of customer satisfaction level.