Foundations of the American Customer Satisfaction Index

Abstract

How do we know if an economy is performing well? How do we know if a company is performing well? The fact is that we have serious difficulty answering these questions today. The economy-for nations and for corporations-has changed much more than our theories and measurements. The development of national customer satisfaction indices (NCSIs) represents an important step towards addressing the gap between what we know and what we need to know. This paper describes the methodology underlying one such measure, the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI). ACSI represents a uniform system for evaluating, comparing, and - ultimately - enhancing customer satisfaction across firms, industries and nations. Other nations are now adopting the same approach. It is argued that a global network of NCSIs based on a common methodology is not simply desirable, but imperative.