Supplier Satisfaction is Rising Among Australian Miners

Wednesday 30 March 2016, Amsterdam

According to the key player latest survey data, Australian miners’ satisfaction with their suppliers has improved since the beginning of 2014.

Having surveyed 100 mine managers and other key decision-makers across Australian mines in early 2014 and again in late 2015, Timetric has found respondents are now more satisfied with their main equipment suppliers. Improvements were particularly notable in areas such as ‘maintenance and service costs’ and the ‘availability of replacement parts’.

In both surveys asked respondents to rank the performance of their main equipment supplier across 16 factors ranging from cost, product and service-related factors.

In the Q4 2015 survey respondents were generally well satisfied with their suppliers across most factors, rating each factor between 7 and 8.4  with the range being from 1 for very dissatisfied to 10 for very satisfied. Previously ratings had ranged from 6.2 to 7.6. Across the range there has been an average improvement of 0.5 points.

Notable areas of improvement included the ‘availability of replacement parts’, ‘maintenance and service costs’ and the ‘depth of data available’. In the 2014 survey, ‘availability of parts’ and ‘maintenance and service costs’ were two key areas that miners specifically cited as important when selecting a supplier and ones in need of improvement, especially as they sought to reduce costs and improve productivity. The improvements in data availability have also helped miners in measuring and managing equipment performance.

“Overall, with their customers facing severe cost pressures amid low commodity prices, suppliers have focused on improving satisfaction with equipment cost and productivity, hence the high ratings areas in these and many other cost-related areas such as total life course, price and energy efficiency,” comments Clifford Smee.