Originally written by SidecarMike on 12/9/2007 12:58 AM
In all my years with Jaguar, Saab, and Fiat...
My mom drove her 1969 Saab 96V4 until the wheels practically fell off.
She finally traded it in on a brand spanking new AMC Hornet Sportabout, complete with Fake Wood Paneling. A very dark day.
" I would also make sure that the offending dealer was reported for their lack of customer service."
YOu hit the nail on the had. Customer service is fine if you are a customer. He openly admits tht he is indeed not a customer. Being a customer means BUYING things from a business. He didn't buy anything from them. Pretty simple. He's a guy who in fact went out of his way to NOT buy something from them but wants to be treated like a customer all the same.
Our local Honda dealer is terrible, I'll gladly go the extra 100 miles to get a new HOnda from the shop in Aberdeen. BUT, if I need warranty work done on it, then its back to Aberdeen to get it done. Thats the trade-off/risk you take when you don't purchase locally.
I can see two sides to this but the fact is that the warranty is a warranty that comes from the manufacturer. The shop is susposed to be a representative of that manufacturer whether local or not. Again, both sides make sense but we cannot lose track of the fact that it is a manufacturer's warranty.
Now, how about guys who buy items off of the net or ebay that a local shop also sells. Then they bring them to the local shop to be installed. This is getting more and more common today and ,yes, it does hurt the local guy to some extent. Is it fair?
Seems pretty rude to me, Claude, but I always did the installs all the same. BUT, if if the customer bought the part from me I only charged the bare minimum of shop time, and if they brought the part to me after buying it online then I charged actual time.
The WORST are those that go to a brick and mortar store to try on helmets, jackets, gloves, tankbags etc then go home to buy it online. Thats flat out thievery in my book.
For the record the Guzzi/Suzuki/Vespa/Velorex dealer here does warranty work whether you bought the bike there or not. And they do installs whether you bought the sidecar from them or not. Great folks, I can't say enough good about them.
Originally written by Lunatic on 12/9/2007 7:07 AM
" I would also make sure that the offending dealer was reported for their lack of customer service."
YOu hit the nail on the had. Customer service is fine if you are a customer. He openly admits tht he is indeed not a customer. Being a customer means BUYING things from a business. He didn't buy anything from them. Pretty simple. He's a guy who in fact went out of his way to NOT buy something from them but wants to be treated like a customer all the same.
Our local Honda dealer is terrible, I'll gladly go the extra 100 miles to get a new HOnda from the shop in Aberdeen. BUT, if I need warranty work done on it, then its back to Aberdeen to get it done. Thats the trade-off/risk you take when you don't purchase locally.
Well, this took about 15 minutes of Google searching:
GM Home: "Where can you get your vehicle repaired? There are more than 7,000 GM dealers throughout the United States and Canada ready to work for you."
FORD Home: "...you can walk into any Ford, Lincoln or Mercury dealership, with no paperwork in hand and that dealership can access your coverage through the Ford dealer communication system...accepted at more than 4600 Ford, Lincoln, and Mercury Service centers."
Chrysler Home: "Whenever you need service or repairs, you can rely on an extensive network of more than 4,800 dealers across the United States, Canada and Mexico to repair your vehicle."
Honda Home: "Do warranty repairs have to be completed at the dealership where the car was originally purchased? No. Warranty repairs can be performed at any authorized Honda dealership."
Etc, etc, Ad nauseam...
Yepper, its a great plan . . . . on paper, Bill. I'm sure the manufacturers are more than happy to tell folks that. But we live in the real world where the dealers have bills to pay and giving away shop time is not good for the bottom line. Maybe the car world is different but I know for a fact how bad flat rate is on warranty work for Suzuki and Moto Guzzi. WAY under actual repair time. I'd be very leary of the quality of work of any tech who acoplished a hydro cam repair on a EV within the flat rate time.
No one denies that the manufacturers claim you can take your car to any of their dealerships to have warranty work done.
Lets sum it up. You don't give your local dealer sales business. You do bring him the not-for profit warranty work. If all goes acfcording to your plan the local dealer goes under and then you don't have a local dealer. Did I miss anything?
Originally written by Lunatic on 12/9/2007 9:14 AM
Yepper, its a great plan . . . . on paper, Bill. I'm sure the manufacturers are more than happy to tell folks that. But we live in the real world where the dealers have bills to pay and giving away shop time is not good for the bottom line. Maybe the car world is different but I know for a fact how bad flat rate is on warranty work for Suzuki and Moto Guzzi. WAY under actual repair time. I'd be very leary of the quality of work of any tech who acoplished a hydro cam repair on a EV within the flat rate time.
No one denies that the manufacturers claim you can take your car to any of their dealerships to have warranty work done.
Lets sum it up. You don't give your local dealer sales business. You do bring him the not-for profit warranty work. If all goes acfcording to your plan the local dealer goes under and then you don't have a local dealer. Did I miss anything?
Hmm : "For the record the Guzzi/Suzuki/Vespa/Velorex dealer here does warranty work whether you bought the bike there or not. And they do installs whether you bought the sidecar from them or not. Great folks, I can't say enough good about them."
You can't say enough good about them? Perhaps that's because they uphold their responsibilities to the customer as Representatives of the respective companies. They seem to get it. Good on 'em.
Originally written by Lunatic on 12/9/2007 10:14 AM
Yepper, its a great plan . . . . on paper, Bill. I'm sure the manufacturers are more than happy to tell folks that. But we live in the real world where the dealers have bills to pay and giving away shop time is not good for the bottom line. Maybe the car world is different but I know for a fact how bad flat rate is on warranty work for Suzuki and Moto Guzzi. WAY under actual repair time. I'd be very leary of the quality of work of any tech who acoplished a hydro cam repair on a EV within the flat rate time.
No one denies that the manufacturers claim you can take your car to any of their dealerships to have warranty work done.
Lets sum it up. You don't give your local dealer sales business. You do bring him the not-for profit warranty work. If all goes acfcording to your plan the local dealer goes under and then you don't have a local dealer. Did I miss anything?
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Seems to me that maybe the local dealer would be bringing back a customer for the future that they failed to get originally if he treated them right and tried to please them no matter where they purchased the vehicle from. If they snub them on warranty work then they have probably lost them forever. Then guess what? They must keep their prices up to make up the difference that they lost in sales ,...yadda yadda....A vicious circle of the blind leading the blind.
Treating everyone right and fair no matter the cicumstances is always the best policy. Yes, it is hard to do sometimes but it can pay off in the long run.
Is the customer always right? No, but they think they are and if we cater to them properly that can bring them in and keep them coming back.
Lunitic, just think where the ones who were snubbed will go for everything from now on. The dealer who snubbed them has it all justified in his mind as he lost then to begin with. Why did he lose them initially? Pricing? Could be. Why were his prices higher? Coudl be to take up the slack for being too short sighted in understanding that how we treat customers is an investment in our future personally.
Yes, what Bill posted does look good on paper. Yes, it is probably th epolicy of the manufaturer that their dealers take on warranty work. Yes, it can be painful for a dealer to do this for those who were not his customers initially. Yes, the customer can turn in the dealer and yes, the manufacturer will probably slap his hand,
The key is for the dealer to get sales. that is where he in his mind can justify doing the warranty work. If he does warrantly work fairly for those who did not initially purchase from him then he may just be bringing them back onto his side.
If there is too much warranty work going on then maybe he shoudl just get another product to represent.
"Pricing? Could be. Why were his prices higher?"
Well his prices might be higher because he has to pay for a service department that is doing warranty repairs on vehicles that he didn't make the sale on. Or it might be that he is in a town with higher property values and payroll is higher so overhead is higher. Or maybe its becuase as in teh case of Guzi, there are a bunch of dealers who took on the brand for the wrong reason and when they went under flooded the market with below cost product (clearly not the case with his 'vette).
The fellow wants to take his new Vette to his local dealer. Why? Location? convenience? Quality of work? Reputation of their service department? Well all of those things are subsidized by the profit from the sales floor. Service and Sales are not ran in a vacuum. They need each other to survive.
When a buyer makes a purchased on price alone its a false savings. Price . .TOTAL price, also included convenience of the location, cleanliness of the business, quality of the staff, on and on and on. As the original commenter found out. He wants the benefits of his local dealer but he does not want to pay for those benefits.
Originally written by Lunatic on 12/9/2007 11:08 AM
"Pricing? Could be. Why were his prices higher?"
Well his prices might be higher because he has to pay for a service department that is doing warranty repairs on vehicles that he didn't make the sale on. Or it might be that he is in a town with higher property values and payroll is higher so overhead is higher. Or maybe its becuase as in teh case of Guzi, there are a bunch of dealers who took on the brand for the wrong reason and when they went under flooded the market with below cost product (clearly not the case with his 'vette).
The fellow wants to take his new Vette to his local dealer. Why? Location? convenience? Quality of work? Reputation of their service department? Well all of those things are subsidized by the profit from the sales floor. Service and Sales are not ran in a vacuum. They need each other to survive.
When a buyer makes a purchased on price alone its a false savings. Price . .TOTAL price, also included convenience of the location, cleanliness of the business, quality of the staff, on and on and on. As the original commenter found out. He wants the benefits of his local dealer but he does not want to pay for those benefits.
No across th eboard correct answer maybe. Lots of good point shave been made here on both sides.
Guess we will just contnue to do the best we can for our customers and trust all will work out good for everyone.
We install what we sell. It's part of our mission. But, we don't always sell what we install. It's worked for us.
A lot of good will, return customers and customer referrals that did generate later sales have come from this policy.
We've installed a lot of sidecars that we didn't initially sell and havealigned and remounted many others that were bought from and installed by others, whether new or used.
This has brought work into the shop that would not have been available otherwise. Fabrication and parts sales for instance.
Lonnie
Northwest Sidecars
