Customer Dissatisfaction (DSAT)

DSAT is the mirror image of CSAT — the share of survey responses that land in the negative bottom box, typically a 1 or 2 on a 5-point scale — and it has no consolidated primary benchmark, so vendor thresholds openly disagree: one guide calls anything under 5% excellent while another treats scores up to 20% as fine. Read it as bottom-box share rather than a universal grade — under ~5% is strong, 5-12% is normal operational friction, and north of ~20% signals a systemic problem — and always segment by industry, since complex sectors like SaaS and telecom carry structurally higher dissatisfaction. Watch the harder primary signal underneath your own surveys, too: ACSI's measured rate of customers who complained directly to companies hit a record 17.5% in early 2026, up from 15.1% a year earlier, even as headline satisfaction stayed flat at 76.7.