appointments

[dew23456]

We have been a first come first serve for many years. I know this hurts us in the long run, but we have a lot of customers that still just show up. I have tried to get my advisors to offer appointments, but when the phone rings they are still told, to many times, first come first serve!
Any suggestions on how to make a changeover that will stick? I don't want to fire everyone and startover.

[btk]

If you are using an appointment system in your DMS, you can view the appointments daily and see who is making appointments or not. Also I always like 1 on 1 meetings with the folks making appointments so they understand why you are changing to appointments. Give each individual a goal in setting appointments- 5 a day or something like that. If you give them a specific goal and a plan to monitor the goal, I think you will win.

[robc]

Pure and simple ... operating like this for much longer will kill your business and profitability. We can't survive having everyone show up at 8:00am in the drive, nor can we take proper care of the customer. The world is changing and taxing customer's like this might not work for much longer.

There's an old trick that still works well - an appointment board in the drive. The day's appointments are written out and in another lane or off to the side is "without appointment" or "Walk-in" - Think of a low-tech Hertz "name in lights" type of display. It is subtle, but not too subtle, way to let customer's know appointments come with benefits. The idea is to make people with appointments feel special and that they have priority. Walk-ins can be first-come, first-served - after the appointments are done.

Second - you have to retrain your customers that appointments mean something - understand that takes a MINIMUM of nine months if not a year to do. Too many times the advisors give up on the process 3 weeks into it. You have to keep on top of them until they realize the importance to the shop and their paycheck to make appointments matter.

Finally, after initial introductions in the drive the first question the advisor needs to ask for a while is "do you have an appointment?"
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** Rob, Editor Dealersedge/WD&S **
Help is only a message post away!
robc@dealersedge.com

[This message has been edited by robc (edited 04-25-2006).]

[SVCDIR1]

I too am converting the advisors at my store to use the DMS system. Reynolds has a very good appt. system. Our advisors will use it for "repair", but will not give up the clip board appt sheet for lof's. We have a "Quick Service Express" building in the final stages. The advisor there will only use the DMS for reservations, and leave room for the drive ups. It is amazing how much some advisors complain about something, then when you change it, they complain!!!

[bmclain]

We make future appointments when they are in for service. It is part of the advisors pay plan. Tracking is very easy in the ADP system. Also have part-time appointment coordinator that does daily reservation log, builds appointment folders, calls to remind customers of appointment/time, and sends appointment reminder letters.

[dew23456]

Let me ask, how much of your daily workload is scheduled appointments?
Our system, AutoMate, doesn't handle appointments, we still have to write them down.
Looking into making an appointment board, I think that idea will help our customers transform to the new process easily.