Japanese brand Honda has come out top in Germany's JD Power and Associates 2007 Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI) Study.
Of the plethora of car reliability surveys released each year, the JD Power survey is generally regarded as the industry leader, with its studies conducted around the world, including France, Britain, North America, Asia Pacific and Africa.
The German study, now in its sixth year, is based on evaluations of more than 20,000 vehicle owners in Germany after an average of two years.
Owners give detailed evaluations of their vehicles and dealers, covering 77 attributes grouped in four measurements of satisfaction. These include quality and reliability, vehicle appeal, which includes performance, design, comfort and features, service satisfaction and ownership costs, which include fuel consumption, and the costs of service, repair and insurance.
Honda was ranked as the number one brand, receiving a customer satisfaction score of 848 index points out of a possible 1,000 points.
This was followed by 2006's winner Toyota, now in second place, just one point behind, followed by Subaru in third place with 836 points. "Since the launch of the Germany CSI Study in 2002, Honda has steadily improved its performance, including a notable increase of 10 index points between the 2006 and 2007 studies," said Martin Volk, senior research manager at JD Power and Associates in Europe. "However, even at the highest level, there is still room for improvement in delivering an exceptional customer experience."
The first German brand appears in fourth place, where BMW scored 832 points just ahead of Mazda and Volvo on 831 points. Germany's other leading executive brands, Audi and Mercedes-Benz occupied sixth and seventh place respectively.
"We notice a strong positive trend for the German brands BMW, Mercedes and Volkswagen this year," said David Lauth, managing director of JD Power in Munich. "All three brands have effectively addressed customer product quality concerns from previous years, and indeed, product quality is driving higher customer satisfaction, together with an improving dealer service network."
With the industry average score cited at 806 points, both Opel and Volkswagen are below this on 798 points, with Ford on 793 and Nissan on 792 - just ahead of traditional poor performers Alfa Romeo and Fiat on 790 points.
At the lower end of the scale, as has become the norm for these types of surveys, there was a poor performance from the French brands Renault, Citroën and Peugeot, lying towards the end of the score chart but these, surprisingly, were ahead of both Kia and Suzuki.
Chrysler, Smart and Chevrolet occupied the bottom three places in the chart. Included in the study, but not ranked due to a small sample size are Daihatsu, Jaguar, Jeep, Land Rover, Lexus, Porsche and Saab. Both Lexus and Jaguar have ranked highly in other JD Power regions, such as the UK.
Toyota's Prius ranked highest among all models in the study with an index score of 892.
Toyota claimed three model awards, while Honda won two awards with BMW capturing one. Toyota's Yaris Verso ranked highest in the small car segment, with the Prius winning the lower medium segment prize. Honda's Accord claimed top spot for the upper medium segment award. BMW's 5-Series came out on top in the executive/luxury segment, while Toyota's Corolla Verso was named top MPV for the second consecutive year, with the Honda CR-V claiming top spot in the SUV section.
"For the first time, a hybrid car has come out on top of the model rankings," said Volk. "It is particularly notable that the Toyota Prius also receives high ratings from its customers for day-to-day operating costs and build quality."