From the Sage MAS Team

[#1]

Me and My New Car – A Customer Experience 

Okay, okay, I know, at first glance you might think it’s not much of a topic for an Engineering Blog, but you may be surprised if you keep reading about my new car buying experience. Yep, believe it or not I broke down and made that once in every 15 years purchase, a new car. Lured by the “cash for clunkers” program, I convinced my husband that we should trade in his beloved 1995 Ford Explorer.  When else would we be able to get $4,500 for a $2,500 blue book valued vehicle?  

After reviewing our budget, we came up with what we thought we could afford. Then armed with a bit of research, the hunt began. I was in charge of the important things like white exterior, dark interior, automatic transmission, adjustable driver’s seat for a short person. My husband was, of course, responsible for fuel efficiency and all that other manly stuff.  We decided we’d try the hybrids, and drove the Fusion, the Prius, and the Insight. But, I’m getting off track a bit, back to the customer experience part! 

For lots of reasons, we decided that the 2010 Honda Insight Hybrid was the car for us. And we thought choosing was the hard part! Turned out the customer experience was — dealing with the dreaded dealership and doing the deal. What a hassle! I’ve had lots of advice since, but let’s just say this was not a fun experience. I pride myself with being a pretty good negotiator, but decided that I had met my match when it comes to doing deals or not doing them, as the case may be. Finally we found a dealer who met our criteria, and they were close to home and work. Ahhhh wonderful, we thought. The price is set, now all we have to do is give them the check -- no hassle here, our credit union was so easy to deal with and we had our money in hand. Well I must have been dreaming, because it only went down hill from there. Getting ready to sign away my husbands baby (remember the clunker), we discovered we were missing one tiny piece of paperwork, one weeks proof of insurance from 2008 – go figure! the government had created this wonderful program to encourage car purchases, but in doing so they also created a red tape and paperwork nightmare for all of the car dealerships. I found out later this was the excuse that the dealer used as the reason that the deal took a nasty turn!. After 5+ hours of back and forth with the dealer’s finance manager, the dealership’s General Manager finally intervened and we worked through faxing the information to them on Saturday, and scheduled the pick up of our car for the next day. 

It wasn’t so much the need to gather all of the “clunker” information that made this such a bad customer experience, it was the treatment we received. Even the subsequent positive treatment we received from the Salesperson and the General Manager didn’t make up for the stress and hassle that was initially caused by the finance department. When we picked up our car, the Salesperson told us we would be getting a customer satisfaction survey. He must have seen the look on my face, because he was quick to let us know that 95% of the survey was counted as a reflection on him. We told him that while he was wonderful, we would probably not be recommending the dealership. He made a wise customer service decision at this time and told us that when we brought our car back to install the accessories we’d ordered, he would personally make sure that the car was fully detailed AND fill the tank with gas. 

Now comes the really good (and important customer service) part! The salesperson actually followed through with his promise. Not only did he personally make sure that we got a call from him when our accessories arrived, he made sure that the appointment to have them installed was at our convenience. Then he again followed up ON HIS DAY OFF to make sure we were happy with the installation and the car itself. And to top things off, we have now had three, yes three, follow up calls from the dealership’s customer relationship representative to let us know how important we are to them as a customer. 

Overall, we are very happy with our car. It’s exactly what we needed and wanted. I am very inspired by the innovative software in the car (more on this in a future blog), am almost over the bad experience, and have now cancelled the voodoo curse on the dealerships finance department.  

Whew, now I do feel better after sharing my experience, but I want to put it in perspective of something that we do every day. Each person in our company (I am including myself here) and yours is important, and must all be aware that they have the power during each and every interaction to positively impact our mutual customers.  I, for one, will take a page from the car Salesperson’s book and learn a lesson about how both good as well as not--so-good customer service affects each individual customer and the perception of both the product and the company. 

Doris Amstutz,

Sr. Director

MAS 90 & MAS 200 IBN

Sage Business Solutions

Message Edited by DorisA on 08-31-2009 11:32 AM

Message Edited by DorisA on 08-31-2009 11:33 AM