Did Your Service Writer Check for Upcoming Services?
The other day a customer brought in a car to a Top Shop for steering problems. Turned out some part was on a national backorder, so the car sat on the lot for a week. This in itself was not a problem.
The problem came to light when the customer got the car back, and realized that oil change was due in 79 miles! The car sat on the lot for a full week, and nobody looked up what else it might have needed. It would have saved the customer the hassle of another visit to the shop – and yes, it’s a bloody hassle. We come to the shop every day, because we work there. But for a customer it’s a hassle, plain and simple. No matter what you offer – free coffee, Wi-Fi, free shuttle or Uber rides, it’s still a hassle – they would rather get it all done with a single visit.
So…
Shame on Protractor for not alerting the service advisor that oil service was due very, very soon.
Shame on the service writer for not looking it up – or even something as simple as checking the windshield tag, that sat right there in the upper left corner of the windshield, showing mileage when next oil service was due.
Shame on the technician who inspected the vehicle, yet did not notice it would be due for an oil change almost as soon as it left the shop.
Would your shop have done better? Are you sure? Every time?
Does your shop have a procedure for catching these services? What about brake fluid flush, transmission flush, power steering flush? There are plenty of maintenance items to be done either after a time interval or mileage interval – are your service writers alerting customers to them? Is your CRM system doing that? Every time, 100% of the time? If it’s not 100% of the time, you are not doing your customers a favor, and you are not doing your shop a favor either.
New Year is around the corner – how about making a resolution to improve front desk processes, and to resolve that as a shop, the new standard is doing it right, 100% of the time.