Improved product quality secures record-low customer claim rates at JYSK

A stronger focus on quality, more inspections, and improved assembly instructions have ensured record-low customer claim rates across all product categories at JYSK.

In the most recent financial year, the number of customer claims at JYSK decreased to just 0.15%, measured by the number of items sold. This means that customer claims have been more than halved over the past decade. Overall, customer claims have decreased across all categories, but particularly significant improvements have been made in furniture, which is reflected in the claim rate.

“We are very proud of our results in continuing to improve the quality of our products. The fact that we have managed to reduce our customer claims continuously every year over the past 10 years means that we have succeeded in what we set out to do: ensuring great quality and great offers. Our targeted efforts are working, and we can see from our increasing sales and very few customer claims that customers have noticed this too,” says Compliance & Quality Director at JYSK, Lars Ringtved Nielsen.

Quality inspections and help from customers

JYSK’s furniture, mattresses, home accessories and other products already have several international certifications. In addition, they undergo multiple quality inspections before reaching customers in JYSK’s more than 3,600 stores across 50 countries, to ensure they meet JYSK’s quality standards.

JYSK works closely with its suppliers during the production phase to ensure product quality and thereby reduce the number of potential customer claims. When JYSK receives products at one of its 10 distribution centres, JYSK also tests and quality-checks the products themselves before they are delivered to stores. In addition, JYSK works closely with external experts such as the Danish Technological Institute on specific product categories, including furniture.

Since JYSK began working with improved quality inspections, the company has also kept statistics on the reasons why customers make claims about products. This documentation shows that customer claims most often concern issues other than the actual product quality. Instead, assembly instructions have, among other things, been a source of issues.

“Assembly instructions play a big role in our work with customer claims. Here, we have been in close dialogue with our customers and have used their insights to continuously improve our assembly instructions. The instructions can be a decisive factor in whether a product is assembled incorrectly and therefore ends up as a customer claim, even though there is nothing wrong with the product itself,” says Lars Ringtved Nielsen.

A strong foundation

Work on product quality has been part of the foundation of JYSK’s sustainability efforts and is also a focus area in JYSK’s new corporate strategy, Customers’ first choice.

“Thanks to our low customer claim rate, we ensure that we produce products that last, and the relatively few that are returned we and our suppliers continue to learn from and improve upon. That is why I am also pleased that our new strategy continues to embrace our work with product quality, so we can place even more focus on what we are already very good at,” says Lars Ringtved Nielsen.

It is possible to read more about JYSK’s sustainability strategy and work with product quality at www.jysk.com/sustainability

Facts:

• A customer claim is registered when a customer receives a replacement product, receives a refund, or is granted a price reduction when returning a defective product.