DealersEdge Professional Forums

Anybody want to share what the single biggest (positive) impact to CSI has been.
Wondering if we may have missed something simple....or complicated.

Biggest single impact for me was changing the advisors payplan from individual stats to a community pay plan, it took the cutthroat out of it and contrary to popular belief-all their stats, hpro,effect. labor rate that they used to be paid from still maintained. Under the old pay plan they were so focused on numbers and staying on the drive that they were jumping dollars for pennies and they did not really see it. CSI went up 7 points.

BTK is correct in having the advisors the main CSI focus.

After that, try automatic email to customers post-service asking "were you satisfied with your service visit today and if not, please tell us how to improve".

One question and we get lots of input! Gives management a chance to put out fires and fix small problems before they get big.

s

[This message has been edited by sallen1 (edited 11-06-2008).]

The main focus should be "Communication". If you have good processes and good techs and you receive low CSI scores, then the factors usually deal with advisor-to-customer communication. If you read your surveys you will see that most of the items could have been controlled by good communication on the advisor's part: Understanding the estimate, understanding the repairs, understanding the costs, repaired on time; etc.

The only difference between stores with great csi and stores with excellent csi is the fact that you educate your customers and encourage them to respond to the survey

Gotta agree with z28. Our biggest improvements came when we got advisors into the habit of routinely asking that the survey be returned with a good score.

Went from below zone average to comfortably above zone average in just a few months with no other changes.

It was that simple.

Cheers
DD

the single biggest (positive) impact to CSI has been

having parts to fix cars .. keeping cars overnite or longer does nothing for csi .. if you can fix the cars in 1 day it does a lot for csi ..

Contacting the customer promptly about any delays on getting the vehicle repaired. Calling as soon as parts/clusters/ect arrive can be a big help. People tend to get mad when they find out the part they have been waiting for has been sitting on the shelf for a week and they havn't gotten a call.

At the end of the day CSI is a measurement of the health of your service department. Just like a doctor you must look at all the symptoms (the feedback your customers are giving you)and determine where the problem lies and take corrective action.
If you don't hire the right people for the drive no pay plan, bonus, etc. will fix the problem. These tend to be a quick fix like a shot of adrenaline which wears off quickly.
Train them or replace them but don't believe that if you wake up tomorrow it will get better because it's a new day.

Single biggest impact?

Hiring nice people.

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Tom Ham
AutomotiveManagementNetwork.com - Hams Management Systems