Chinese smartphone manufacturer, Xiaomi has recently completed its five years in the country, and the phone manufacturer is celebrating its five years in India with much fervour. As part of its growth plan in the country, the Chinese company is now focusing on customer service in India. In accordance with this plan, Xioami has started a service van pilot in the Delhi-NCR region. Xiaomi has also announced that it plans to run the service van pilot in the Delhi NCR region for two or three months before it expands to other regions in the country.
Xiaomi Inaugurates 2000th Authorised Service Centre
Xiaomi has also opened its 2000th Authorised Service Centre in Delhi only and now the company has audacious plans of spreading its service coverage to the 100% of the population. It is worth noting that currently, Xiaomi has a 90% population service coverage in India. Muralikrishnan B, Chief Operations Officer, Xiaomi India, told ET about this new development, “Our main focus area is to expand the reach of the service network in the country as our business grows…there are black spots which we want to fill. We have identified our expansion.” The executive also shared that the company has also started providing TV installation across all cities of India. In addition to this, 800 out of 2000 total service centres of Xiaomi cater to both Smart TV and smartphones.
He further added about this new development, “We learned our lesson and fixed this problem. Our service centres now stock spare parts keeping three months’ projection in mind.” In order to complement its after-sales service plans, Xiaomi has also improved its spare parts supply chain so that consumers don’t face any hassle while they go for service of their Xiaomi products. Currently, Xiaomi has two spare parts warehouses, one in Gurgaon and second one Bangalore.
Xiaomi Emerges as Best Smartphone Brand in After Sales Service
According to the data compiled by Counterpoint, the Chinese smartphone manufacturer has kept its lead with a 28% share in shipments which have been growing by 6% year-on-year in the quarter ending June 2019. Muralikrishnan also cited the Red Quanta research and pointed out that Xiaomi is currently leading among the smartphone players in India when it comes to after-sales service and it has maintained its lead for three quarters in a row. He further added, “….in a benchmarking study conducted by AC Nielsen, it was identified that Xiaomi is amongst the top-performing brands… We are investing in training this workforce to further improve service…Diwali shopping season is approaching where there will be up to 4x the workload on centres for installations… we are building capacities.”
The executive pointed out Xiaomi has managed to grab ISO 9001 and 14001 certifications for the after-sales quality management systems that it has brought to practise. Also, for the customers of Xiaomi who would like to upgrade their smartphone, the company has launched a buyback programme. For this, the company has partnered up with Cashify to assess the value of old phones. For now, the service has only been rolled out in the Delhi-NCR region.
