Prepare to be shocked. According to J.D. Power and Associates, some of the most unhappy mobile phone customers are ones with 4G LTE smartphones. The sole reason? Poor battery life.
The data J.D. Power and Associates collected shows that dissatisfaction with battery life alone on LTE smartphones “greatly impacted” overall satisfaction of the phones. 4G smartphone owners gave their devices a rating of 6.1 out of 10 on average. On the other hand, customers with 3G smartphones rated their devices 0.6 points higher at 6.7. Battery performance for smartphones in general has resulted in a decline in customer satisfaction with LTE-equipped handsets from September 2011 when the average rating was a 6.9.
Some brands might not care all that much about customer satisfaction once they sell the phone, but this study indicates that is not a good point of view to have. Only 25 percent of customers that reported complete bliss with their smartphone’s battery life (10 out of 10 rating) said they would stick with their handset’s manufacturer when making a future purchase. Just 13 percent of customers that gave battery life a 7 to 9 rating said they would stay loyal. Now imagine the customers that are actually pissed off with the battery. In a nutshell, even if a 4G smartphone has terrific battery life, vendors are facing serious loyalty issues.
On that note, here comes another shocker. For the seventh consecutive time, Apple ranks highest for smartphone customer satisfaction among manufacturers. It achieved an 839 out of 1,000. HTC follows closely behind with a 798. Early reviews of the new iPad with LTE suggest Apple seems to have accomplished a rare feat: maintaining stellar battery life in a product with 4G LTE baked in. Inadequate battery performance is one of the main reasons why many speculate Apple took so long incorporating LTE into its iOS devices, but now that it’s finally here, it looks like the company is doing a hell of a lot better than its competition.