NEW YORK, NY - JupiterResearch, a division of Jupitermedia Corporation (Nasdaq: JUPM) has found that of the 92% of Web sites offering email as a customer support option, only 41% acknowledge receipt of customers' messages with automated email responses. According to the JupiterResearch report entitled: "U.S. Customer Service & Support Metrics, December 2005," retail companies remained relatively consistent with results of previous years and other industries, such as finance and travel, showed significant decreases in auto-acknowledgement response performance. JupiterResearch is a leading authority on the impact of the Internet and emerging consumer technologies on business.
The research also shows that since 2000, the number of sites meeting a 24 hour threshold for email response continues to decrease. In fact, only 45% of sites resolved email inquiries within 24 hours. The most significant trend, however, is that 39% of sites took three days or longer to reply or did not respond at all. The number of these sites has grown 7% year over year from 2000 to 2005.