Ed Rayeski

Talking with your peers about how to confront shared business challenges is the most valuable part of this event. Consumer Returns 2014 has set aside seven hours across three days so OEMs, retailers and solutions providers can discuss current issues of importance. This is your opportunity to discuss ways to improve out-of-box experience, post-sales support and methods for maximizing recovery rate.

Roundtable Discussions:

1. Being Green Throughout A Product's Lifecycle: The Cradle To Grave Approach To Sustainability - Facilitated by Layth Hussain, Director, Operations, Americas, Belkin
2. Tracking Serial Returners: Retailer experiences & The Growing Consumer Backlash - Facilitated by Sue Martin, Vice President, Customer Service, Newegg Inc. and Kunal Thakkar, Senior Vice President, North American Operations, Newegg Inc.
3. How Do We Change Consumer Behavior Around Returns? - Facilitated by Frank Martino, Director, Service Division, Samsung Electronics Canada
4. Online Consumer Education - Facilitated by Rubina Farooq, Director, Customer Operations, LG Electronics
5. Leveraging Remote Access And Support Technologies As A Returns Avoidance Strategy - Facilitated by Lee Gibson, Director, Reverse Logistics, Huawei Device USA
6. Creating Organizational Structures That Enable Quality Follow Through: Applying A Fix To One Product And Making It Applicable To Multiple Product Lines - Facilitated by Ed Rayeski, Director, Handset & Device Support, ZTE USA, Inc.
7. Confronting Warranty/Service Fraud - Facilitated by Rachel North, Director, Post Sales, Toshiba America Electronic Components
8. Applying The Net Promoter Operating Model To Your Business: Building Loyalty To Your Brand - Facilitated by Tony Sciarrotta, Former Director of Asset Recovery, Philips Consumer Lifestyle
9. Customer Experience Management: Building A Strategy That Encompasses All Touch Points From Call Centers To Social CRM Channels - Facilitated by Tony Popson, Director, Customer Care and Quality, Nokia

Ed Rayeski, Director, Handset & Device Support, ZTE USA, Inc.
Amy T. Augustine, Manager, Reverse Logistics, U.S. Cellular
Michael Deaton, Director, Americas Repair Operations, Microsoft
John Meagher, Director, Service Operations, Samsung Telecommunications America

Quality is a make or break function. Poor quality not only impacts return rates but also erodes trust in your brand, given that consumers talk to one another about their experiences and shape the attitudes of their peers toward your brand. Wireless OEMs and carriers face a particularly challenging quality environment. Increasingly global development makes it difficult to communicate throughout the supply chain and needed changes must be applied across a host of different programs, while being incorporated into next generation design. An added challenge is that OEMs are often receiving product feedback from carrier call centers and are one step removed from the customer. What's truly wrong with a product can often be distorted. This panel session will consider some of the principal challenges. Attendees will learn how to:

• Get closer to the customer: How can OEMs directly access their customers and identify what issues exist in the field? How can you proactively reach users (i.e. social channels - Facebook and Twitter) and provide solutions to help them?
• Overcome organizational structures that are not always set up to enable good quality follow through and responsiveness: OEMs may fix an issue with one product but the carrier's expectation is that all products to follow will contain the same fix and that's where OEMs often fall down - when they don't have a good mechanism with R&D to kill the issue across multiple programs
• Ensure the quality level of suppliers and sub-suppliers: How do you ensure the quality levels of suppliers and sub-suppliers so some simple component/assembly is not your undoing?
  

1. Best Practices In 3PL Management - Facilitated by Michael Ketzenberg, Associate Professor of Information and Operations Management, Mays Business School, Texas A&M University & Joyce Cruts, Director, Return Management, Acer America Corporation

2. Greening The Reverse Supply Chain: Tactics, Tools And Technology - Facilitated by Amy T. Augustine, Manager, Reverse Logistics, U.S. Cellular

3. Partnering For Sustainability: Developing A Recycling Program - Facilitated by Chuck Johnston, Director of Repair and Returns, The Home Depot

4. Identifying The Best Sales Channels For Refurbished Goods - Facilitated by Kathy Murphy, Senior Sales Operations Manager, Jarden Consumer Solutions

5. Repair Partner Management - Facilitated by Doug Ugarte, Senior Vendor Manager, Handset Service & Reverse Logistics, ZTE USA, Inc.

6. Analyzing The Impacts Of Kill Switch Legislation - Facilitated by Ed Rayeski, Director, Handset & Device Support, ZTE USA Inc.