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Stories from Retail Auto Service


patsbimmer1

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As some of you know I am a Regional Manager of Auto Service.  I oversee 12 locations here in Wisconsin and work directly with the Automotive Service Centers.  I've been with the company 11 years or so and I've worked my way from the ground up.  Over the years I have encountered some "interesting" customers and I thought I'd share some of these stories.  I won't be using any real names nor will I disclose which location these situations happened.  I swear to you these stories are true but you're welcome to believe what you'd like.  I'll use this thread to dump some of these stories as I remember them and as new ones come up. 

So gather round children and listen to my tales...

A few weeks ago within the same week I had what I like to call "hero" customers.  These are customers who will call out another customer usually for being rude or obtuse.  First scenario happened while I was helping at one of the desks to sell tires to customers.  A customer and his father stroll up to the desk and tell me they need four tires and start talking to a newer associate.  He asks for year/make/model as he should and continues on to ask some qualifying questions to get them into the right set of tires.  The son is maybe in his late 40's early 50's and the dad is probably in his 70's and in a wheelchair.  The tires are for the fathers vehicle but the son is doing the talking.  The son told the associate we had a buy 3 get the 4th free sale going on and he confirmed and said that the quote would reflect that.  The associate writes up two quotes and prints them off and begins to show them to the son and explain the benefits/features of the two different tires and goes through the various line items.  Immediately the customer yells at him and says he "fucked up" the quote.  The associate quizzically looks at the customer and asks why he believes that.  The points out that the paperwork says 4 qty and it should be 3.  The associate explains that for inventory purposes we have to put 4 qty on but we take 25% off of each tire to equal the price of one tire.  The customer starts yelling at the guy so I break away from my customer to step in and ask what the concern is.  He explains to me that we're trying to rip him off, this is fraud, bait and switch blah blah blah.  I ask him to give me a moment to look over the paperwork to ensure it's correct.  I write up another order in the mean time at full price and print that out.  I put the full price order next to the b3g1 free order and show him that indeed the associate wrote it up correctly and that the full price order minus the price of a tire equals the quote he was given.  He's not getting it.  Now's he's yelling at me about lying, he should have gone somewhere else, more bait and switch and so on.  The whole time the dad is yelling at him to leave it alone and it makes sense.  Along comes our hero customer...  Another gentleman hears this, walks up to the guy and extends his arm to put his finger in the guys face and yells "HEY! I'm gonna say what this guy can't but your a fucking idiot and you can't do math!  It fucking makes sense!"  The customer spouts off something about how he know's math and that's how he know's he's being ripped off and the hero customer says something along the lines of "NO!  You're a fucking idiot!  Leave the guy alone!".  The customer calmed down enough to let his dad make a decision then he spouts off about how replacing rubber valve stems is a scam because he's never had one go bad in his life.  I explained to him that there is no extra charge for rubber valve stems so there is no scam and yes, rubber does in fact deteriorate over time.  We get past this and his dad pays for the special order tires.  Later on the dad came to me and apologized for "his dumb ass son".

More to come...

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Same week in the same store on a different day I came in and immediately see that shit has hit the fan.  I go to the Service Manager and he explains that a tech called in who had a full workload and another tech is refusing to do rear shocks on a Honda Civic because there's "stuff" in the trunk.  First things first I pull in the Civic  and pop the trunk to find that there were some Aldi's bags, a blanket, a shovel and a small hand tool box.  I go to the tech and politely ask them to start working on the Honda which is now 30 mins behind.  They say no, they don't believe it's their responsibility to take stuff out of the customers trunk to do the work.  I said it's reasonable to assume that someone may have things in their trunk so please remove the items.  They said they don't know why it's there responsibility when it's the customers fault.  I asked if they were refusing to do the work.  The tech kind of looks at me and thinks for a moment then says yes.  I said, "OK, i'll take that as your resignation from the position.  I'll need to look through your tool box before you leave."  The Tech is stunned.  They start to stumble on their words and say "You can't do that!".  I calmly explained that yes, in fact, I can.  Refusing to perform a reasonable task means you no longer want to perform the job duties necessary for the position which means you no longer want to be employed.  They fumble through a couple more words and I interrupt with "Hold on, I'm a reasonable person so I will give you another chance.  Please do the shocks on the Honda.  I tell ya what, i'll even take out half of whats in the trunk."  They replaced the shocks on the Honda but we're still behind almost 40 minutes at this point.  I spend the rest of the day busting out work to try and get caught up.  Through a few other unforeseen events we end up about an hour behind.  I've got customers getting called ahead of their appointments to let them know we're running behind.  One lady in particular shows up at her scheduled time and we pull it in an hour late.  Her TPMS light was on when we pulled it in so I scanned it and found that all sensors were reading.  I met with her in the waiting room, explained that the sensors were reading so it should be as simple as relearning the TPMS once we replace the tires.  She thinks that's great, thanks me and the tech does the tires.  Tires get done and I knew we pulled it in late so I again met her in the waiting room to let her know the vehicle is done, i'm very sorry it took so long, thank you for your patience and here's a $50 gift card.  She begins to scream at me and just generally try to belittle me.  I take it and walk out.  Walk back in to the waiting room for something else and hear hero customer #2 say something along the lines of "Listen bitch, we've all been waiting!  They told us they were behind!  Can't you see these guys are busting their asses!?"  She says something and he says "You got your fucking gift card, leave the guys alone!  The longer you yell at him the longer it takes to get our cars done!"  She walks out.  That hero also got a gift card that night for his patience with us.

It doesn't end there with this peach.  I walk back to the shop and ask the tech how resetting the TPMS went, I received a blank stare.  As this is happening I hear a yell from behind me.  She's back in the building because her light was still on.  I apologize and go outside with the tool and she watches me try to relearn the TPMS sensors.  They all read but my tool won't communicate with the car.  The whole time i'm getting the beans from her and i'm very apologetic.  My favorite part is when she says "I know it's not your guys fault, the corporate office shouldn't do this to you guys, they demand all of this and you guys have to deal with it and they need to support you better." and this continues.  The look on her face when I calmly told her I am the corporate office, i'm the Regional Manager of Auto Service out in the field supporting my team was priceless.  I then got the "Well you guys need to hire people!" so I explain what we're doing to actively find candidates, what the hiring pool looks like right now and finish with "Do you know anyone looking for a job?" and it all comes together for her and she says know.  She was actually pretty understanding after all of this as I continue to have issues getting the tool to communicate.  She says the vehicle has a warranty and she's taking it to the dealer so she'll just have them look at it.  I agree this may be a good idea because everything is telling me it's not a sensor issue and it's not a tool issue so the dealer may be able to spend more time diagnosing it.  She leaves and all is good... or is it.

Part 2 coming soon.

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Part deux

2 days after we serviced said customers vehicle and she tells me shes going to take it to the dealer I receive a call on my cell phone from her.  She tells me that she took it to the dealer and they told her the light was on because she had 3 dead sensors so she wanted to know what I was going to do for her.  Thankfully I took a screenshot of the sensor readings and sent this to her before her appointment with the dealer so I asked her if she showed this to them.  She said yes and that they said our tool wouldn't work because only the OEM tool can scan these.  That's a lie.  I explain to her how untrue that is but she's still adamant that we need to pay to fix this.  I told her that i'm happy to set up some time to have the Service Manager look at it again but as far as diagnosing it goes we've already determined that the sensors are not bad and it's impossible that I would get a reading with 4 individual ID's if the sensors were bad.  She says that the dealer told her it was common for "other" places to break sensors when they install tires and this is probably what happened.  I reminded her that the light was on when it came in, all four sensors read before we started working on it AND she watched me scan all four sensors multiple times AFTER we installed the tires and they all read.  Logic need not apply in this situation, she still believes it's our fault.  I told her that I'd be happy to put 3 new sensors in but when that doesn't turn the light off i'd like know to what level of responsibility she'll hold the dealer to for misdiagnosing the issue and how she plans on compensating us for our time spent following their misdiagnosis.  She hadn't thought about this and went silent.  She agreed that in that scenario she didn't know what she would do but knew that she didn't want to pay for this mistake.  After more discussion I told her that i'd pay for half of her deductible for her warranty to have the dealer fix this issue but I wanted to see the invoice before I paid anything.  A couple days go by and she emails me the invoice... the last page of the invoice with a total.  I asked her for the rest of the invoice with the detailed line items.  She sent this over and I quickly realized why she didn't want to send this to me... *gasp* the dealer misdiagnosed the issue! *gasp*  It stated on the invoice that they replaced 3 sensors and AFTER replacement found that the light turned off BUT they also found that a TPMS initiator had failed.  

Here's a tech lesson for everyone.  In some vehicles there is a TPMS sensor in each wheel.  This communicates to an initiator in each wheel well which communicates to the control unit that deciphers the inputs from the sensors and spits it out to your dash.  These sensors do not typically become active until the vehicle is in motion.  So, you may be asking "well if the dealer replaced the sensors and the light turned off then there MUST have been bad sensors AND a failed initiator.  What a coincidence!"  And to that I say no.  What happened was they replaced the sensors, cleared the TPMS codes and did a TPMS relearn which turned the light off.  In most cases if there is an active TPMS code you cannot complete a relearn without clearing them.  So, the tech probably thought very highly of himself until he actually took it for a drive and saw the light pop back on because the sensors communicated to the initiators and the system saw that one initiator wasn't working.  He thought, "Oh shit.  Well fuck it, she's only paying her $350 deductible anyways and we're already over that amount so might as well say it needed both!".  This is wrong.  This is immoral.  This gives the auto repair industry a bad name.

So, after further reading I also saw that the dealer says they replaced 3 sensors but in the line items they only have 2 sensors on the invoice.  Maybe the advisor screwed up, maybe they only put 2 in, who know's.  Either way, it's another discrepancy to prove their incompetence.  I take it a step further to call that dealer AND a second and third dealer of the same OEM to ask if the initiator will cause the light to be on.  The dealer she took it to said "I don't know what that is let me ask a tech.... My tech has never heard of a TPMS initiator."  The other two say "Yes, it will cause the light to be on even after replacing sensors but not until the vehicle is driven."  I point all of this out to the customer who chooses to ignore all of the facts I just laid out and ask when she can pick up her check.  Now, by this time I'm angry and want to tell her to go pound sand and rip the dealer apart for ripping her off and slandering my name.  I calm down and think about how much more time i'm going to spend arguing with this person and how much higher my blood pressure will rise.  I had the store cut her a check for $175 and told them this was "go away" money.  Win some, lose some.  This was a moral victory for me but still hurts thinking about it.

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I had a customer reach out to me with a vibration issue on his 2007 Nissan Sentra.  The timeline goes something like this:  4 tires installed November of 2015.  December 2015 we recommend struts and install an inner tie rod he supplied and provided an alignment. August of 2017 we install 4 more tires, install outer tie rod and perform alignment.  27k miles go between sets of tires.  Customer comes back after the tires are installed in 2017 and says he has a vibration on the front passenger side.  The Service Manager has him come back in and they perform a road force balance on every time and find that all are well below tolerance.  For those that don't know what Road Force balancing is it's when the balancing machine actually applies downward pressure on the tire via a large cylinder to simulate the force of the vehicle being applied to the tire.  This is the best way to determine if a tire is out of round, has a hard spot, etc and if you can force match the wheel and tire assembly to eliminate a ride disturbance caused by a tire/wheel.  So, the tires and wheels aren't causing this guys vibration and the Service Manager explains this to the customer.  During this conversation the customer states that he had this issue prior to having the tires replaced and assumed it was the tires so that's why he bought another set.  He is absolutely convinced that the tires are the problem and wants a free upgrade because in his mind he now has gotten two sets of the same tires that are faulty.  The store reaches out to me and I send our assistant equipment manager in to inspect the vehicle.  This guy used to be a tech for us and I have very high regards for his ability to diagnose these sorts of issues.  The store works it out with the customer and he comes back in.  My guy determines that the tires are fine, the alignment is fine and nothing was damaged during the install of the outer tie rod.  He also determined that the brakes were fine, front suspension and bushings were fine, struts, CV axles seem to move without issue, etc.  He has no idea what's causing the vibration but knows it's not the tires.  The customer is livid and calls me.  This is where it gets good... I am on the phone with the guy for close to an hour arguing about the cause of his vibration.  He wants a free upgrade and I keep telling him no but i'd be happy to replace the other tires with another set if he'd like to pay the difference.  I explain to him that I am unwilling to do anything because 1) It was a pre-existing condition and 2) He diagnosed his own issue and never told us about this vibration.  It's impossible for us to determine if the original set of tires wer bad because he never gave us the opportunity to inspect them.  I finally ask him why he believes the tires are bad and I will never forget his response.  He gets quiet... I can hear him thinking... finally , in a somewhat hushed tone he says. "You might not believe me but I know it's the tires because God told me it was the tires."  I repeated that back to him and he confirmed, God told him the tires were bad.  He won.  He pulled the Trump card.  He out crazied the situation.  At this point I asked which set of tires he'd like and he said he hadn't thought about that.  I told him to go do some research and let me know which set of tires he'd like BUT I want him to have the vehicle inspected by a Nissan dealer near by.  I have dealt with this dealership in the past and knew they wouldn't throw us under the bus in the name of a dollar.  I said if the dealership determined that it was the tires then I would happily upgrade him to whatever tires he wanted.  He agreed.  He called me a couple days later and said that he took the vehicle in and they determined it was the outer tie rod we installed was loose and that was causing the vibration.  I discussed this with him, got the name of the Service Advisor and called them.  The Service Advisor laughed and said no, they did not tell him that a looser outer was causing the vibration they only made note that a new one had been installed.  They did however determine that there was an internal failure of the CV axle causing it to bind and they believed that's where the vibration was coming from.  I report this back to the customer and he does some back pedaling.  He tries to make whatever argument he can for this free upgrade in tires and goes as far as to say that I must have believed to some extent the tires were bad otherwise why would I ever tell him we'd upgrade him.  I threw it back in his face that I have continued to make the argument that the tires weren't at fault based off the my knowledge of how this works and the ONLY reason I ever conceded was because he told me that GOD TOLD HIM THE TIRES WERE BAD.  I told him I could only argue within logic and reason and his argument was beyond that.  As you may imagine this did not go over well.  We ended our conversation with him not agreeing with my decision to do nothing for him.  Over?  I think not.  A week later the guy calls me and says he still has the vibration and wants to know what we're going to do about it.  I reiterated that the CV axle was diagnosed by Nissan and asked if he had it replaced.  He said no because Nissan wanted to charge to much so he wants to know what we'll do for him to compensate him for the time he's spent on this.  I said i'd be happy to give him a quote at full price and that's it.  He argues some more to the point that I stopped offering to give him a quote and flat out told him to take it to anyone else other than us to have this fixed.  We left it at that and I never heard from him again.

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This thread is amazing. We need a bigger heart icon.

This reminds me of the days when I worked full time at the bike shop. Think of all the crazies that cant get their drivers license or have it taken away for sucking on a bottle................. They all end up riding bicycles. I have stories of customers stealing soap, hugging employees until they cry, and even one guy shitting himself in the store. 

I salute you for sanity and ability to add some intelligence into the human race.

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

You guys are too kind!  I've been in the auto industry for 12ish years or so and in retail for 11 years and I've heard some doozies but the general public always manages to pull out something new!

Today is a little education about the BBB and how to get action out of a company.  This is a card customers love to pull and for whatever reason people think this is a threat.

First a little background on the BBB.  They are a privately funded non profit who say their mission is to improve marketplace trust.  Early on they assisted in a few law suits that helped shape some industries but over time they have become less effective.  Problem number one is that they are NOT a government agency.  They cannot levy fines or penalties against a business.  The most they could do is bring a lawsuit against a business but other than that they are strictly a company that acts as a mediator.  The second problem and the largest in my opinion is funding.  They are funded by the same businesses they are accrediting.  The ONLY way to get an A+ rating and become accredited is to be a paying member in the BBB.  The actual performance of the business is only part of how they are scored.  I can tell you from dealing with these complaints that as long as you respond in a timely manner it really doesn't matter what the customer is alleging.  You won't get any further than if you spoke to the same representative at whatever business you have an issue with.  When a customer threatens to file a complaint with the BBB my favorite line is "Well that complaint is just going to come right back to me and we're going to have the same conversation so would you like to save both of us some time and deal with it now?".  That has usually worked for me but some people are just stubborn and insist on wasting my time.

Now, if you actually feel like you have a legitimate complaint then you need to file a complaint with the DATCP (Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection).  They CAN levy fines and penalties and those complaints are taken VERY seriously.  Not that I don't take BBB complaints seriously but they don't carry the same weight as an email from the DATCP.  At least in my position if a complaint is filed with the DATCP I treat it as if it could go to litigation and I know from past experiences that my response could very well end up in a court document.

My best advice if you have an issue with a business is first and foremost try and resolve it with someone at that location in a calm manner.  If that doesn't work then seek out help from their corporate office.  If that still doesn't work then file a well organized complaint with the DATCP.

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Thanks for going into this in detail. The public understanding of the BBB reflects the success in the way the organization presents itself. That the BBB "signifies trust and integrity" is their mantra ... but there is much less public knowledge that businesses pay to be accredited and the ranking hinges on paying. When I opened a business in the mid 1990s I was initially pleased to be contacted by the BBB and invited to join. Then I found out about the pay to play and said no thank you. Would public perceptions of the BBB stamp change if they had more knowledge as to how accreditation works? I think your point on the limited ability/leverage of BBB as a consumer advocate is more important.

For a business, the choice to go with a BBB membership is basically an advertising decision. If your public interface is such that the BBB stamp matters (e.g., typically if your competition has it but you do not) then you pay to play. Reputational coercion as a baseline and the BBB makes its membership money.  Dig a bit reveals that sites such as Angie's List and Home Advisor ratings have their own racket dimensions, and then there is the whole issue of dealing with real and fake reviews on the array of social media sites. I can't remember if it was on this site or elsewhere that I was also reading about the craziness regarding complaints and auto dealership service department surveys. 

Ultimately, and back to the point of business-consumer relations you hit it perfectly: "My best advice if you have an issue with a business is first and foremost try and resolve it with someone at that location in a calm manner. If that doesn't work then seek out help from their corporate office.  If that still doesn't work then file a well organized complaint with the DATCP."

Looking forward to the next installment of the retail stories.  Any examples of customers and calm manner?     

 

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9 minutes ago, Boris3 said:

I can't remember if it was on this site or elsewhere that I was also reading about the craziness regarding complaints and auto dealership service department surveys. 

BMW NA's customer feedback/review surveys (at least around 2013) would fail the dealer if the customer rated them at anything 4/5 or below. Harsh but I think it was meant to keep service managers running the dept as close to BMW's guidelines/best practices and kept BMW NA involved with the individual dealer's services.

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On 12/29/2018 at 9:46 AM, Boris3 said:

Any examples of customers and calm manner?     

I have a lot of those!  I'm much more likely to work with a customer or give them the benefit of the doubt if they are calm and professional when talking to me.  I'm working with a customer right now that had purchased a set of Cooper tires about a month ago and feel that the tires "don't fit right" because the tire doesn't cover the rim.  They believed that their last tires were closer to the hubcap and covered the rim.  I've spent weeks talking to these people trying to find a solution for them that fit's their cosmetic want while also trying to convince them that the way the tires fit is indeed how they are supposed to fit.  I've taken pictures of other cars with steelies and hubcaps to show them the gap that exists between the hubcap and tire is normal and reached out to other professionals for their opinions on the pictures of the tires on the wheels.  I've spent weeks building trust with these people... Weeks.  The customer sent an email to Cooper when they started talking to me and Cooper JUST responded to them saying the tires don't appear to be seated on the beads... Cooper has ruined weeks of trust that I've built up with these customers by making an ill informed comment.  Cooper is also refusing to stand behind their "diagnosis" and will not reimburse me or the customer for the time spent reseating the tires.  Thankfully the customer sounds like they still trust me as I continue to try and find the right solution for them.  If this customer was a jerk I would have sent them packing but because they've approached the situation calmly I am putting in the time to try and make it right for them.

On 12/29/2018 at 10:00 AM, YoungCR said:

BMW NA's customer feedback/review surveys (at least around 2013) would fail the dealer if the customer rated them at anything 4/5 or below. Harsh but I think it was meant to keep service managers running the dept as close to BMW's guidelines/best practices and kept BMW NA involved with the individual dealer's services.

That's pretty standard in dealers.  A poor CSI score can impact someones pay depending on how the pay structure is set up for that team.  If you want to get a dealers attention then give them a poor CSI score.  We utilize a CSI but don't receive many back.  We spend A LOT of time responding to online complaints and reviews and a lot of them just make me shake my head.  We had one within the last few weeks that stated we took 2.5 hours to do a rotation/tire check on their vehicle.  Well, when my Service Manager looked into it the vehicle was dropped off an hour before the appointment, the customer left and came back 1.5 hours after the appointment and the vehicle had been completed before they showed up.  When the Service Manager reached out to the customer and asked why she wrote the complaint she stated that she wasn't inconvenienced by the situation at all and had in fact left with someone so she wouldn't have to wait in the waiting room.  She wrote the complaint because she saw other bad reviews and thought she should add one... I wish I could say this was abnormal.  When customers are confronted about these reviews they act like they had no idea someone would actually read them.  Keyboard warriors waste hours of my time every week.

23 hours ago, Jdesign said:

VERY good item to highlight. I have very little experience in BBB but I do know it works very similar to the JD power awards. LOL

 

Dude, don't even get me started on JD Power!  Quickly, the Initial Quality award that GM LOVES to tout awards a manufacturer for making a vehicle with few issues WITHIN THE FIRST 90 DAYS OF OWNERSHIP.  They claim that within the first 90 days of ownership you can determine a vehicles long term reliability.  Well, according to a report I saw recently of vehicles most likely to still be on the road after 15 years roughly ZERO of the winners from 2003 were on the list.  Making a car that won't break for 90 days of ownership is like making a meal that won't give you diarrhea until 36 hours after you've eaten it instead of 24 hours.  Congratulations, you still made shit.  JD Power is a marketing company.  They sell the right to tell people about your car getting an award.  It's in their benefit to have as many vehicles as possible get an award.

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