Dubai Financial Market (DFM) announced that it has today launched a first-of-its-kind Brokers Excellence Rating initiative as part of its constant efforts to promote service excellence. The Rating will be implemented in cooperation with Dubai Economy in order to assess excellence of services provided by DFM-licensed brokerage firms to their clients and their achievements in terms of embracing the UAE’s digital transformation and innovation strategy in order to strengthen the country’s global rankings in excellence, innovation and happiness.
The new initiative stems from the vision and directions of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, UAE Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, which emphasizes on achieving service efficiency and excellence of various institutions in Dubai and the UAE through state of the art customer service centers that employ the most innovative and smart solutions.
The DFM Brokers Rating measures the strengths and weaknesses of various communication platforms between brokerage firms and its client base including; customer service centers, call centers, websites and smart phone applications. The rating aims at ensuring companies achieving highest levels of efficiency and prompt customer service. The Rating employs various tools including a Mystery Shopper programme, site visits to customer service centers as well as companies’ head offices.
As part of preparations to implement the rating, Hassan Al Serkal, Chief Operations Officer (COO) and Head of Operations Division of DFM, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Khalid Al Kassim, Assistant Director General, Economic Policies & Studies at Dubai Economy, which will manage the Mystery Shopper assessment and provide DFM with the results through quarterly reports. The two sides agreed to form a coordination committee to pursue the enforcement of the MoU.
Commenting on the initiative, His Excellency Essa Kazim, Chairman of DFM said:
The DFM has rapidly succeeded to strengthen its leading position amongst regional exchanges in terms of developing innovative services to capital markets’ participants. Our innovative services represented a quantum leap in the ways of serving participants not only at the regional level but also globally. These efforts are inspired by the wise vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, UAE Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, as His Highness always emphasizes that there is no finish line in the journey for excellence, as well as the necessity of implementing a smart transformation strategy in all sectors. Accordingly, we are fully committed to collaborate with all DFM partners to embrace this vision and cope with the expectations of market participants. We are delighted to launch the Brokers Excellence Rating today in a widely welcomed step by the brokerage firms. This initiative underlines the mutual commitment to build upon the achievements of the past years in terms of brokerage services and communication platforms with investors as part of realizing DFM’s vision as a world class regional marketplace and its core corporate values of efficiency, innovation and integrity, leading to the highest levels of efficiency and customer satisfaction.
Undoubtedly, the Rating will play an important role in recognizing excellence and innovative brokerage companies, and further strengthens the competitiveness of the brokerage sector with companies keen to enhance their rating and further invest in service provision platforms in general and smart services in particular. This drive will further enhance service excellence and sustainability as well as increase customer satisfaction. Certainly, the collaboration with Dubai Economy reinforces our efforts in this field and underlines the commitment of Dubai’s institutions to join forces in order to achieve the strategic goals,” HE/ Essa Kazim added.
We are pleased to be partners with Dubai Financial Market and consolidate our efforts to elevate the levels of customer satisfaction and quality in Dubai. Dubai Economy will extend its Mystery Shopper programme to DFM to visit and assess their brokers every quarter and the programme will account for 70% of the Rating process,” said Khalid Al Kassim.
The Mystery Shopper programme plays a significant role in benchmarking quality and excellence in customer service provided by institutions in Dubai. The confidential report prepared by the Mystery Shoppers is based on key points starting with the customer journey, general appearance of the outlet, focus on the customer’s comfort, health and safety, as well as a comprehensive assessment of HR policies and standards, service delivery, and payment facilities,” added Al Kassim.
Five rating categories
The Rating includes five categories as per stars number from one to five, for the 47 DFM-licensed brokerage companies based on service excellence. The Rating will be quarterly reviewed, which creates strong dynamism amongst brokerage firms in order to enhance their position in the Rating and ultimately improves services provided to customers as well as the operational efficiency of these companies.
Rating criteria
The Rating has two criterion – the first one focuses on customer experience based on the Mystery Shopper that measures consistency of the experience across direct dealings, company website, and call center, and the weightage of the criterion is 70%. The second criterion measures the brokerage firm’s ability to cope with DFM’s vision and has 30% weightage based on four pillars including; services efficiency, service innovation, multi-channel access and commitment to Corporate Governance.
The Rating creates an ongoing mechanism enabling brokerage firms to identify strengths and gaps based on the evaluation conducted by experts and evaluators as well as the results of customer satisfaction surveys and Mystery Shopper.