dealerships...

under the guise of strong customer service the car dealers that i've been in contact with rarely actually get it right, certainly their service has not been amazing.

take my most recent experience with petersen pontiac. my vehicle was brought to them and to their credit, they did a great job of getting my vehicle into the shop quickly...diagnosing the problem and then fixing the problem all in about 5 hours total time.

originally the service person informed me that pp was booking into next week (this was taking place last thursday.) so they did a great job in making my vehicle a priority.

here's where it all falls apart.

after showing up on time to pick up my vehicle, the paper work was not drawn up correctly...it had me paying for the $923.00 in repairs. those repairs by the way...replace a fuel pump and fuel filter....some will feel that this is acceptable pricing and those who do probably enjoy those bills...thank-goodness for warranty's that's all i can say when their shop rate is $112/hr

so i wait for an additional 25 minutes for my paperwork to be completed properly. i'm to cover the costs of the fuel filter...$100.49 for in reality a $10.00 dollar item installed in 20 minutes...

i then go to leave and see that my fuel gauge is showing empty or so near empty that i would never attempt to travel anywhere except directly to the closest gas station...the needle was on the red line...now when it was towed over there in the morning i had approximately a 1/3 of a tank...with my vehicle i've learned to watch the fuel carefully...and with the way my tank is, when it's low, it's a crap shoot on whether you make it to the gas station...even parking on an incline forces the fuel to settle so that it won't start...why i am saying this is to demonstrate that i NEVER let my tank get this low because of finding this out the hard way ONCE...

now many of you will already know that many fuel pumps are actually located inside the fuel tank and so in order to work on this part, they have to get inside that tank...so what do you do if the tank is full or in my case has 1/3 of a tank...well you have to drain part of the fuel...now pp says they would lose no more than a litre of fuel at most...except the evidence suggests otherwise.

here's where things get stupid...it becomes my word versus their word...i simply want the fuel in my tank replaced, not once did i suggest that anyone "stole" the fuel. this was simply part of the process and i only want an explanation and the fuel back...first if this was par for the course on a job like this then i should have been informed ahead of time that i was about to lose all my fuel and that they had no intention of putting it back as part of the process. or an explanation of the fact that in my case things went differently due to unforeseen circumstances and that they were at least apologetic...

neither happened...instead i was IMMEDIATELY made to feel as if i was looking to scam pp and get free fuel out of the deal...the service person at one point even said "how do you suggest i deal with this, take money out of my pocket so you can go buy gas?"

i told her "there was no need to make this personal"

i understand that there probably are a fair amount of people out there looking to take advantage of others...i'm just tired of people jumping to that conclusion first...it shows a mistrust for the customer and it never ends well...how about a "can do attitude instead of a can't do it because you must be lying and trying to scam us attitude."

the service person says to me, "do you want us to take a reading from the computer to see how much fuel was in the tank before we worked on it?"

i said, "absolutely, if you can do that then do it, that would be perfect."

so the service manager comes over with his computer and after punching a few buttons he says to me "it says here that your tank capacity is 89 litres and you currently have 13% of that capacity in your tank."

well, first of all i thought, thanks for wasting even more of my time...as that will do little to comfort me standing on the side of the road on the crest of a hill...if i make it that far...sure enough that almost happens...

also, my tank actually holds a hundred litres because i've put that in and when i went directly to fill up i put in 87 litres. so somewhere along the line their math doesn't make sense...not to mention that fact that manager boy missed the entire issue to begin with, most likely because his staff member didn't communicate properly.

so the end result was I was tired of being the honest guy who was being accused of making accusations when all i was doing was providing them with a chance to ensure that in some way i was completely satisfied with the experience...what are we talking about $25.00 in fuel? their service records would show that this was not my first visit...

and for all of you saying to yourself, yeah and if they gave away $25.00 worth of fuel to everyone, suggesting the cost of such a move would be prohibitive...

to which my response is...probably the best marketing dollars they could have spent...in fact, it should be a rule...no vehicle leaves with less than a 1/4 tank and evey vehicle is washed, looking and smelling clean before it leaves even for oil change customers...now the accountants will be up in arms and for all of you who allow an accountant to actually run your organization, your costs will almost certainly be in check and your customer experience will also suffer for it...

this idea is way more effective spending of marketing dollars than another cheesy radio jingle, discount car ad's and a marketing slogan that clearly isn't worth the ink in terms of actual experiences.

this is the difference between amazing buzz and run of the mill mediocre marketing...it sends a message "we're different, we amazing and we'll prove it with every action, evey time..."

NOT pp's approach i assure you. these guys did nothing but waste my time from the moment i got there to pick up my truck with no apology, in fact, the service person even suggested that the reason her paperwork wasn't in order was because i didn't use the rental car and that had to be removed...a partial truth and not the sole reason the paperwork was inaccurate...remember warranty work versus paying the huge amount? the fact that she also forgot to remove the rental car was just another example of her sleeping at the wheel...

during the last part of this discussion, i was surrounded, including the service person, saying..."i didn't say that!" it was duck and cover, protect our butts and make sure there were witnesses to the event...

not once during this entire situation was i made to feel as if i was important, or that they actually cared about making sure i was really happy...they didn't smile, their language and tone was accusatory and defensive...

i told the collective crowd "this is continuing to be a complete waste of my time." to which the service manager said, "well, we better let you get going then." and the service door went up immediately...

al petersen is the "dealer principle" and his marketing slogan is "al cut's the mustard everytime," on his mustard bottles throughout his building it says..."we're not completely satisfied until you're completely satisfied." well, that was not the approach i experienced in this case...al sits in his office upstairs and rarely spends time on the floor of his dealership, the reason i know this is that when you observe his staff it's evident that his marketing slogan is exactly that...a slogan that holds little in the way of influence on daily customer interaction and even though there's this blown-up version of a customer survey in the service area, i certainly wasn't offered one this time and actually i've never been offered one in my past experiences either...

(al, if you really want people to fill these out, make them available...)

one final note...the service person told me she would speak with the service tech who worked on my vehicle the next morning to find out what happened and call me with the results of that discussion because she felt bad for how she handled the situation and she didn't want things to end on a bad note...admirable...

i'll give you one guess as to whether i actually got that call...