Machining Rotors under warranty

[robc]

I guess we all can sympathize with getting poor customer service, but I am not sure how good it does to walk into a room full of dealership employees (like this forum) and say youre terrible.

In my dealership migrations I went from a Porsche store to a Pontiac one and it amazed me how seriously Firebird drivers took these vehicles. They are just a car and barely one Id even consider quick or well handling. I had fewer complaints from people who owned actual sports cars for 3 to 4 times the cost. They are driven hard and then drivers wonder why they wear out. Its because they are an economy sports car!

Then there is always the complaint of a known product problem. Everything that always breaks is known about and some consumers feel the manufacturer should be on the hook forever for it. Cars break. They break for reoccurring reasons. End of story. Its true for GM as much as it is for any other manufacturer. If there is anything I hate more about working in automotive it is this underlying feeling by too many consumers that everything should be free.


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** Rob, Editor WD&S **
Help is only a message post away!
robc@dealersedge.com

[warr_wiz]

I have worked in GM dealers for over 22 years now and I have seen a lot of things come down the pike. I agree with Rob when he says "underlying feeling by too many consumers that everything should be free." When you think about it there is one reason and one reason only that I come to work every day. To earn a living. And I am sure the dealer feels pretty much the same way. Dealers are not in business to give away the house. Is it really wrong to expect to earn a profit? I recently had a customer with a 94 Van and he believed his broken front end part should be warranty since it was a manufacturers defect. Now, living in Ma within the "high corrosion" area, he is lucky the body is still intact. But after calling customer assistance, the owner of the dealer, and now the BBB, the customer has now left the vehicle here until we fix it. And he told us right up front he will not pay. The way he said it was a bit more colorful than I will show you here. I know of no other industry that people feel they can treat employess in such a way. If you went to K Mart, screaming and swearing at the top of your lungs, how long would you last? Why is the auto industry looked at as a bunch of stiffs. A technician today is probably FAR more educated than most of the screaming customers. Do you really think the accountant down the street can diagnos a .5 ohm resistance in a class 2 bussed wiring circuit in 0.0-0.3 hour depending on actual time taken to perform? I must say John in LA you, along with some of the customers I have to deal with, should look a little more into what the real world is like inside a dealership. Work out front or on the service desk for a while and I think your opinion will change. Believe me, the vast majority of dealers and dealer employees do the absolute best they can with what they have to service vehicles. We don't design, manufacture, or build the vehicle. We repair them. And that is not always an easy thing to do.

[Doug]

A great deal of this problem, in my opinion, stems from the concept of making customers.....any customers, any product.... "completely satisfied" and the customers getting pretty pushy and demanding about it. I call it the Nordtrom's syndrome...
essentially, the consumer is spoiled and comes to expect that none of the rules apply to him. Nobody expects to pay for anything anymore and they act surprised when simply stating "that's not acceptable" doesn't make us drop to our knees. Or, better yet, the famous "you'll be hearing from my lawyer" (I always offer to let them call their lawyer right then and there...using my office phone...so I can speak to the lawyer personally and get things straightened out. Never had a taker on that)

Maybe 23 years in the business is getting to me but, honestly, if I hear one more customer say that his foul language, abusive behaviour, unrealistic demands and continual complaining is justified just because he paid $25,000 for his truck I think I'm gonna go off the deep end !!!

Ending now....I could rant on for hours but that's not what this forum is all about. Besides, I'd only look as foolish, and be as poorly regarded as the customers I am describing.

Cheers,
Doug

[SHERI01]

AMEN!! AMEN!! AMEN!!
I WOULD ALSO LIKE TO ADD THAT IT IS EVEN WORSE WHEN THE CUSTOMER GETS THE REPAIR FOR FREE(BECAUSE GM CUSTOMER ASSISTANCE RARELY BACKS THE DEALER ANY MORE), ABUSES THE SERVICE WRITER, MAKES ACCUSATIONS ABOUT THE CHARACHTER OF THE TECHNICIAN(AND HIS WIFE,DOG,FISH, AND GERBIL), BRINGS THE RENTAL BACK TWO DAYS AFTER THE CAR HAS BEEN FINISHED(IT IS JUST TOO INCONVENIENT TO COME BACK SOONER), THAT CUSTOMER THEN FEELS THAT IT IS PERFECTLY ACCEPTABLE TO VERBALLY ATTACK THE CASHIER(AND WE ALL KNOW THAT THESE POSITIONS ARE GENERALLY ENTRY-LEVEL CLERICAL FOLKS, OFTEN YOUNG WOMEN WHO CAN OVERHAUL A NORTHSTAR ONE-HANDED IN THREE HOURS!!), SIMPLY BECAUSE THE CAR HAD TO BE REPAIRED. AND DO YOU NOTICE THAT THESE ARE THE FOLKS WHO DO THEIR OWN ROUTINE MAINTENANCE?? IN OUR STORE, IF IT IS A DEFECT IN THE MATERIAL OR WORKMANSHIP, WE TAKE CARE OF IT UNDER WARRANTY. IF WE ARE MAKING A "GOODWILL" DECISION, WE MAKE A DECISION TO RETAIN A CUSTOMER'S "LOYALTY", NOT JUST "SATISFACTION". AS JEFFREY GITOMER SAID"CUSTOMER SATISFACTION IS WORTHLESS, CUSTOMER LOYALTY IS PRICELESS". WE TAKE CARE OF THE CUSTOMERS WE MUST KEEP. THE ONES YOU CANNOT AFFORD TO DO BUSINESS WITH, AND THEY ARE OUT THERE, WE LOOK AT WHAT THE "GOODWILL" INVESTMENT WILL RETURN. IF THE ONLY RETURN IS NEGATIVE, WHY THROW MONEY AWAY?? IT MAKES NO DIFFERENCE WHETHER IT IS THE DEALERS "POLICY" MONEY, OR MANUFACTURER GOOWILL MONEY. IF YOU KNOW YOU WILL LOSE, DON'T INVEST.

[gizmo]

Doug,

I think you're going a little bit overboard. Unless all your customers are first time car owners, they'll have an idea of how long a set of brakes should last. If the brakes on their new $25K truck fail at say 11K miles under "normal" usage, don't they have a right to be upset if the dealer attempts to deny them warranty coverage?

Let me turn your "Nordstrom Syndrome" analogy around on you...

Assume you bought an expensive pair of brand name shoes. After 3 weeks of normal use, the soles fell off. Would you not return to the shoe store & ask for a free replacement? Would you not be upset if the shoe store denied your "warranty claim"?

SHERI01--

AS JEFFREY GITOMER SAID"CUSTOMER SATISFACTION IS WORTHLESS, CUSTOMER LOYALTY IS PRICELESS".

IMHO, that's a matter of semantics. A SATISFIED customer IS (or will be) a LOYAL customer.

[RickW]

There is no reason that Service Department personnel should put up with customer abuse. I worked in the SD of a Chev store and several years. The dealership owner would not tolerate unprofessional or immature behavior on anyone's part. Every morning when the SD opened, he was right there talking to customers, putting on seat and floor covers, and parking cars. When he came upon this type of situation, he would immediately intervent and try to calm everyone down. If he was not able to satisfy the customer, and the customer continued to raise his/her voice and be abusive, the owner would ask the customer to leave ONCE. If the customer did not comply, the owner would tell the customer to leave or he would call the police and charge the customer with trespass. If the customer still did not leave, he followed through with his statement, and called the police. I witnessed this several times. If the customer threatened legal action, the owner carried business cards of his lawyer in his pocket, and would provide one to the customer with the instructions on having his lawyer contacted at any time. The owner did this right in front of everyone in the SD. This allowed the other customers to see that the SD had done everything possible to satisfy the customer, but there were lines that could not be crossed without penalty. The owner's method was effective, because our CSI stayed high, and the SD Gross Profit steadily increased. Several other customers that witnessed these events commented how well the situation was handled, and they appreciated how far the SD would go to satisfy a customer. Action like this requires a dealer with a backbone and intestinal fortiude. That is a rare comodity these days. Keeping in this vein, a suggestion to warr-wiz about the van. If the decision has been made not to repair the vehicle under warranty or goodwill, send the owner a certified, return receipt letter stating this, and effective a certain date he will be assess a daily storage fee of a reasonable amount. State that the owner has 30 days from that date to pay the total fee and pick up the vehicle, and if he fails to redeem the vehicle within the time frame, the vehicle will be claimed by a mechanic's lean equivalent and sold for scrap to recoup the storage fee. We had good response when we employed this tactic.

You never want to see situations get to this point, but eventually you must make a stand.

[robc]

I am laughing to myself, because this post got me thinking about my first week as a service advisor in a dealership - lo so many moons ago.

Our dealer was kind of like that, he didn't take people getting out of hand and if necessary would throw them out too. He was really great to people, but if you wanted to get tough with him you were going to lose.

Anyway, about my third day on the job just about anyone could see I was being intimidated by some more aggressive customers, constantly calling the service manager for back up. Finally the dealer came over to me and said,

"Look, Rob I can see you're a little shy about standing up for yourself - what to you think will happen?"

Well I felt some of these people were really mad and sometimes they seemed like it was ready to come to violence - or close to it.

"That's it," he said, "you think someone is going to take a swing at you across this counter. Well, let me tell you something - it will probably never happen, but if they do I hope they make it worth their while. Then he got quiet and looked me straight in the eye and said in complete seriousness, Because me and everyone in this shop will be on them so fast that they won't know what hit them. Rob, I've been in this business 20 years just waiting for someone to throw that first punch, and you can believe that I am not going to waste that opportunity."

I never was afraid of anyone after that.
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** Rob, Editor WD&S **
Help is only a message post away!
robc@dealersedge.com

[This message has been edited by robc (edited 03-07-2001).]

[Doug]

Reply to Gizmo:

Well, I *was* ranting a bit and admitted as much !

You've mentioned service examples which don't illustrate particularly difficult scenarios.

Anyone on this forum would certainly take care of worn out brakes at 11,000 miles....no questions asked.....just as Nordstroms would take care of a customer with 3 week old shoes. No brainer, really. Any of us could meet or exceed customer expectations in that example.

Here's the difference: a Nordstrom's customer can bring back a pair of 3 year old shoes saying "I'm not happy with the purchase" exepcting, and receiving, a refund. The shoes certainly didn't carry a 3 year warranty but nevertheless, his money was refunded.

A person who buys a car and brings it back at, let's say, 41,000 miles demanding that his worn out brakes be replaced under warranty will not get the type of satisfaction he is accustomed to getting at Nordstroms...will he ?

My point...which, judging from your examples, I think perhaps you are missing....is that consumers' expectations are ever increasing and doing so at a rate that we sometimes can't keep up with.

I'll bet that every member of this forum is very pleased to help any customer with legitimate warranty issues. The current conversation really pertains to customers with unrealistic expectations and abusive, demanding attitudes.

The unrealistic expectations comes from other industries and from our own as well.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it gets tiresome when customers use "completely satisfied" as ammunition against us. I, for one, don't like being held over the barrel. On more than a few occasions I've had over-the-phone customers say "I've got the survey right in front of me....." and then want to know if I'll take care of an issue that really isn't a warranty concern.

Still, though, we all realize that we can't let a (relative) handful of disagreeable customers taint our philosphies on taking good care of the great many who are decent folks with legitimate concerns.

Cheers to all,

Doug

[mark vandersteeg]

what i want to know is....has anyone replaced worn brake pads on the new GMT 800 platform yet? if so, how many miles did it have on it. i have some 1999 models sold in mid-1998 that have 100k miles on the pads and still going. i think GM has responded to brake wear complaints, and now pad longevity will be going the other way, lasting a long time, (at least on trucks). now we'll be screaming that they make them too good and we can't sell brake jobs!!!

[mark vandersteeg]

we warranty pulsation for the duration of the warranty. the customer may have to pay for pads if they're worn or we put the worn pads back on. BUT WHAT I REALLY want to know is....has anyone replaced worn brake pads on the new GMT 800 platform yet? if so, how many miles did it have on it. i have some 1999 models sold in mid-1998 that have 100k miles on the pads and still going. i think GM has responded to brake wear complaints, and now pad longevity will be going the other way, lasting a long time, (at least on trucks). now we'll be screaming that they make them too good and we can't sell brake jobs!!!