JEDDAH, 12 May 2005 — Axiom Telecom, the telecommunication and mobile services company, is expanding its presence in the Kingdom to 150 branches by the end of the year, according to its Operations Manager Jamal Al-Bagmi. Asharq Al-Awsat, a sister publication of Arab News, reported that the company has made all preparations to issue mobile chips of Etihad Etisalat (Mobily) which signed an agreement with Axiom allowing it to distribute and sell all the services provided by Mobily in Saudi Arabia.
Al-Bagmi also said that Axiom intends to open the largest Nokia selling centers in Riyadh and Jeddah and has established the largest mobile maintenance centers in its main branches in Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam. The company is distinguishing itself in customer service by guaranteeing the price and paying back the difference to the customer if the price was lowered at its branches within five days of selling the mobile.
The company also guarantees replacing the mobile for five years and fixing it within 8 hours if defected.
“Our sales have increased by 50 percent during the past year since we opened here because of our customer service. Our aim is to provide quality service in a short period of time,” said Besher Sawaf, customer service supervisor of the western region, to Arab News.
The main service center at City Plaza was opened a year ago and another is being established on Tahlia Street in addition to the many already available service points in Jeddah. The service points are for selling and drop-off and pick-up of mobiles in need of maintenance.
“We are planning to open service centers in Makkah and Madinah and service points there. We are also planning to implement quality control and the mechanism for efficient feedback between customer care staff and maintenance staff for faster and better service,” he said. One of their key service options is a temporary swap of a mobile during maintenance and a short period to fix it.
“The most common problems customers have with mobiles, about 80 to 90 percent, is wrong use of the unit or downloading applications that affect the software, and only 10 percent where the unit is defected,” said Sawaf.
Product choices are also another competitive advantage being pushed. “Axiom depends on getting new products, the latest, that helps us be on top,” said Sawaf.
“We try to get technical support from the mother brand and we send our technical managers on regular training abroad in order to become trainers to the trainees here in addition to getting the newest equipment, tools and spare parts,” he said.
Currently, Axiom offers products from Nokia, Sony-Ericsson and imate but it intends to provide products by LG, Motorola and Samsung soon. “We don’t have the technical support for these other three yet but as soon as we do we will begin selling their products,” said Sawaf.
There is a focus on training Saudis and providing job opportunities. “The Saudis we have are well cultured, flexible and eager to learn,” he said. “The mobile market in Saudi Arabia is exploding and it continues to grow and we plan to continue growing with it,” he said.