Irish cable TV operator Chorus came last of 64 in an international customer service survey of telecoms companies.

The Customer Respect Index (CRI), which measures companies' responses to online customer queries, gave the Dublin-based cable and telecoms provider a score of just 2.6 out of a potential maximum of 10, placing it last on a list of 64 international companies.

Chorus has around 200,000 subscribers in the Republic. The High Court placed it in examinership earlier this year with debts of €385 million. Global player Liberty Media, a shareholder, rescued the company by buying up its entire share capital.

The CRI is the standard benchmark for online customer care with Fortune 1,000 companies. This was the first time that the study included Irish companies, according to web specialist Elucidate, which has the Customer Respect Index licence for the Republic.

Compared to their global counterparts, Irish companies performed poorly. The average score for Irish telecoms was 5.3, compared to 6.2 in the US, 6.6 in Canada and 5.7 in the UK. Eircom was the best performer in the State with a score of 7.4, giving it an overall placing of 14.

The winner was Comcast, with a score of 8.3. The global average was 6.2, while the bottom five Irish companies, which included NTL, Esat BT, Etel and Calyx, averaged just 4.2.

All the Irish companies failed the first criterion - providing a website easily accessible to people with disabilities - while one-third did not provide online privacy policies.

Elucidate managing director Ms Maeve Kneafsey blamed Irish companies' poor responses to queries for their below-par performance. "According to the survey, 22 per cent of Irish companies did not reply to either of the enquiries we submitted, while 21 per cent only replied to one," she said.

"I believe that none of these companies would find it acceptable not to answer a customer's question if they were in direct contact, which shows a pretty dramatic disregard for customers who choose to do business online," she said.

The survey found that 67 per cent of Irish companies did not respond to all enquiries put to them.

Overall, nine Irish companies were surveyed. The survey judges points like privacy, customer focus, transparency, ease of navigation, content and speed of response to customers.

Elucidate is an internet specialist and consultant. Its clients include Eircom and Esat.