Expectation setting

I recently purchased a bed at what I consider to be a pretty good price. The salesperson, lets call her Bev, offered to "throw in" the installation package which would normally be an extra $50. She explained that the men who delivered it would "install" it. She also said that we had a choice between the bed just being on castors or having legs. As we wanted to reduce the height of the bed we opted for the castors. Well the bed was delivered pretty much as they said it would be (minor altercation about having to pay extra for delivery on a saturday - they told us this extra would also be waived and they eventually agreed to do that). The bed arrived and was placed against the wall in our bedroom. Before we knew it the delivery guys had left - so much for installation! Then when we unpacked it we realised that we had been given legs, not the castors only that we had been promised.

So, as a salesperson, if you want repeat business, you have to be sure that the customer got what you said they would. Once the expectation is set you must ensure that the expectations are met. I would encourage all retail salespeople to folow up wiht a phone call to make sure that you got what you paid for. Bev could have done that given they sit around in the store doing not much at all on a Saturday - it would take maybe an hour to do that each saturday and would ensure repeat business.

Official Mileage

Hmmm, who owns the official mileage figures that the auto dealers provide when you buy a new car. I recently bought a Toyota Rav 4 and have been very pleased with the car. It was bought with a lot of factors in mind but one of them was the "official" mileage figures provided by Toyota. I had researched the car on line and found that most people did not believe the official figures, so even before I bought the car i had some insight into the fact that the official figures were, shall we say, dodgy. But little did I know they were as dodgy as they actually turned out to be. So who is looking out for the consumer here? As far as I can tell, there is no one. In fact, it would seem that the auto manufacturers can provide whatever figures that they want and no one actually cares at all! What about you - have you had figures misquoted? Did you buy a new car where the figures were significantly wrong? What did you do about it?

Porsche Centre Melbourne - how NOT to do it!

I own a Porsche and I'm proud of it. I was warned but others when i bought my car that it would be expensive to keep on the road and they were right. But it is even more expensive when your getting ripped off by the dealer who services your car! About 2 months ago i put my car in for its 120,000klm service. Yes, it cost a bomb, but I also reported a small problem with the gear shift in that when the car was in park it could not be started. The problem had occurred about 12 months before and been fixed (by this dealer) so didn't think it would be a major drama. I got the dreaded phone call, the problem was related to a switch that would cost $600 and a further $300 to install. Well if thats going to fix the problem then I guess we should do it - but the switch had to come from Germany, so I went to pick up my car while we all waited for the "switch", When I picked up my car the transmission didn't work at all! It was basically undriveable! Call up PCM, they say, "oh, wasn't it like that when you brought it in". Um, no, actually, it was quite serviceable when I brought it in! Ok, bring it back and we will look at it. So i drop it off and they look at it. Hmmm, looks like the transmission control unit needs replacing. I say, but it was working fine until you people fiddled with "something". They say, no it must have been on its way out. That will be another $3,500. So they put the "switch" in to fix the original problem and it doesn't fix the problem. They then think the control unit will fix the problem so they do that and it doesn't fix the problem. So far the bills are over $6,000!!! However, PCM believe they have not done a good job diagnosing (you think!) and so I only have to pay for the $3,500 control unit. THye install and give me back my car. The transmission works almost as good as 3 months ago before i took the car to Porsche - but guess what, the same problem is still there! SO i take it back in and finally they get someone other than the 1st year apprentice looking at the problem. They diagnose a small plastic "nipple" that had split. Probably about a $40 part to replace (10c on any other car) but now they don't have time to wait for the part from Germany (do these guys hold any stock at all?) and so they weld it together! Good news is it fixed the problem. The bad news is it cost me over $3,000 when it should have cost me under $100. So for my next service I will be trying one of the other Porsche service centers in Melbourne. I'll let you know what I think of their service.

The WOW Customer Service Blog

This BLOG is dedicated to the best and the worst customer service stories. I have long been a person who believes in WOW customer service and how this type of service makes a difference to businesses. So I thought I would highlight my own experiences with both good and bad customer service and give everyone who reads this an insight into the impacts of both good and bad customer service.