Lexmark has made enhancements to its service model in Australia, resulting in faster restore times and more reliable service. This nationwide roll-out will benefit regional areas and is part of a shift as organisations move their focus from Service Level Agreements (SLA) and technical performance to Experience Level Agreements (XLA) and a more holistic view of overall customer satisfaction. Lexmark is positioned at the forefront of this trend in the Managed Print Services (MPS) industry.
Serving 75% of Australians within 48 hours
Lexmark's refined service zoning achieves faster response times for warranty holders and accelerated restore times for MPS and MPS Express customers. This strategic move is in response to changing population trendsopens in a new tab, which show faster growth in Australia’s key regional centres. The new approach ensures that 15% of Australia’s population will experience improved levels of service across these regional areas.
With these changes, 75% of the Australian population will experience onsite restore (for MPS and MPS Express customers) or onsite response (for warranty customers) within 48 hours of Lexmark receiving all necessary information. The commitment to rapid service is a testament to Lexmark's dedication to enhancing customer experience.
Comprehensive Review and Re-engineering of Logistics
The enhancements were driven by a thorough review of Lexmark's extensive nationwide service logistics infrastructure. This infrastructure currently supports tens of thousands of devices under MPS management across 14,000 locations nationwide, including some of Australia's largest essential service and critical infrastructure providers. Key logistics processes have been re-engineered, and service level commitments have been strengthened by Lexmark's nationwide team of technicians.
Lexmark's advanced technology platform offers deeper visibility into machine health, ensuring the correct part from a pool of over 14,000 service parts is identified and delivered to service technicians supporting 75% of Australia's population within 48 hours.
Together, these innovations drive better service outcomes and customer experience for Lexmark customers. They come as a product of a new way of assessing service delivery performance, which focuses on more holistic Experience Level Agreements (XLA) as opposed to traditional Service Level Agreement (SLA) measurement.
A broader look at service delivery boosts customer satisfaction
Traditionally, Service Level Agreements (SLAs) have been the standard for measuring service quality. In the Australian Managed Print Services industry, SLAs have traditionally focused on predefined metrics such as response times and uptime, providing a clear framework for service expectations. However, there is a growing recognition across many service-oriented industries that these metrics do not fully capture the customer experience.
Experience Level Agreements (XLAs)opens in a new tab represent a shift towards a more holistic approach to service management. Unlike SLAs, which emphasise technical performance, XLAs focus on the overall user experience and satisfaction. This shift prioritises how customers feel about the service they receive, leading forward-thinking service providers to focus on the actions that drive customer satisfaction. In the Managed Print Service industry, this plays out in four key areas:
- Focus on User Experience: While SLAs measure objective metrics like response time, XLAs assess the subjective experience of the user, including ease of use, satisfaction, and emotional connection to the service.
- Perception-Driven Metrics: XLAs rely on qualitative data to gauge user satisfaction, whereas SLAs depend on quantitative metrics.
- Outcome-Oriented: XLAs aim to ensure that service delivery aligns with user expectations and leads to positive outcomes, rather than just meeting technical benchmarks.
- Holistic View: XLAs provide a comprehensive view of service quality by considering the entire customer journey and experience.
Lexmark’s entire organisation – from product development and delivery through to service management and data analytics teams are laser focused on XLA-driven outcomes. The pursuit of customer satisfaction stems from the very design of our products to be easy to use, maintain and service right through to the development of our service infrastructure and processes.
- Robust product designs reduce the number of service calls required in the first place. More than 90% of all managed devices in Australia did not require a single service call in the past 12 months.
- Devices and a purpose-built global IoT service technology platform provide an unrivalled depth of insight into the health of each machine. This allows Lexmark to predict when service may be required before the end user notices any issue, and to remotely address up to 70% of all service calls – within 15 minutes.
- A revolutionary new print engine design on Lexmark’s latest A3 devices means that in the event a technician is needed onsite, most service actions can be performed within 15 minutes, rather than over an hour.
- A comprehensive, globally aligned service infrastructure and consistent set of processes drives pursuit of device restore rates rather than just technician response rates – meaning Lexmark is focused on restoring the device sooner, rather than merely attending to it only to have to return at a later date with the correct part.
Service excellence drives “no noise”
For most of Lexmark’s Managed Print Service customers, print is an essential yet often overlooked category in the overall IT portfolio. Print still powers several business-critical processes across various sectors, enabling health providers to care, retailers to sell and governments to serve. As digital transformation initiatives mature, customers increasingly “just need print to work.”
Lexmark’s service-first approach from across the organisation means customers enjoy “no noise” when it comes to managing day to day print. Evidenced by a customer retention rate of over 99% in Australia over the last decade, the latest range of service improvements simply enhance this experience further.
The improvements to service zoning in Australia are a significant step forward in our continuous effort to enhance customer experience. A result of a significant effort right across the service delivery team, Lexmark’s technicians, supply chain and service response teams have all worked together to deliver an even greater level of service to our customers across Australia.
For more information on Lexmark's Managed Print Services and the latest improvements, see here.