As an editor who covers the auto industry, sometimes I have an experience with a dealership that reminds me what it’s like being a typical consumer. Sadly, sometimes, the experience isn’t that great, and it reminds me our industry still needs to keep working hard to improve our performance.
Recently I brought my plug-in hybrid sedan in to a local, and well respected, dealer one Monday morning because the warning lights suddenly came on saying there was an issue with my brakes. I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary, none of the telltale brake squeaking or pulling that signals an issue or anything like that.
So when I got the text from the dealership saying there was a serious issue with my brakes, I was a little surprised since my car had passed a safety inspection when I purchased it a year earlier. I say this, because the context is important. I was a consumer who didn’t expect this serious of an issue, and the matter of fact way the “bad news” information was communicated to me wasn’t great. The text exchange was curt, and in lower case, and seemed to be delivered by someone who was just in a hurry to get it done and onto the next thing.
Dealership: “long story short, the vehicle is malfunctioning because your brakes are in very bad shape.”
Me: “Ok. Pads? Rotors? What does it need?”
Dealership: “it needs everything including brake fluid flush… front and rear pads rotors and shims.”
Me: “Ok, what is that total?”
Dealership: “$2,265+tax. everything including diag.”
Me: “Holy crap.”
Me: “I’ve never heard of a brake job costing that much.”
This was my sticker shock moment. I told them the car had passed safety a year earlier, and he simply said: “A vehicle can pass safety with minimum requirements.”
This next part of the customer experience wasn’t great. Given I was concerned about the scope of work and unexpected expense, I was eager to learn more about what they had found. I got a text with a link to a technician’s report on my vehicle from their DMS provider.
It opened a browser that showed attachments for front pads, rear pads, front rotors but none for rear rotors. When I clicked on the first two attachments, I got an error message: “An unhandled error has occurred. Reload.” I clicked reload and nothing happened. When I clicked on front rotors it took a while but finally loaded images where I could see they were worn. There were no pics of the rear rotors.
I texted my service contact that the images weren’t loading, and he texted back. “Sometimes it takes a while depending on the resolution.”
Another annoyance was the quotes. The texted quote was one amount, the link I was sent had another number, and the final total was yet another number. So which one did I approve? I was also never presented with an option to explore non-OEM parts, so was charged the maximum amount for this service: $1245.26 for parts and $930.00 (5.4 hours) for labour.
I shot a note to the Dealer Principal about my experience and I got a call from the dealership’s service manager. He said he had reviewed the communication, recognized the gaps, and in a follow up email said: “We do value your business and I apologize that the communication was not clear and concise or other options given during this experience but will use this as a training tool for our advisor (All Advisors) and staff members at every guest interaction.”
Ok, I’m starting to feel better about this. Most importantly, he sent me a detailed email explaining what they’d discovered, why it was important to do the work, and included all the pictures. Ok. Slam dunk. Trusted him. Believed him. No need to question. Proceed.
Now why couldn’t they have taken five minutes and done that the first time? Is my business not worth taking five minutes of quality time to communicate properly with me?
