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IN TROUBLED TIMES…
Listed under: Comments
Published: Monday, September 12, 2011
In troubled times, a phrase we seem to have been saying constantly since August 2007 when the crunch started, one would think that retailers selling luxury goods, such as cars and Hi-Fi, would be falling over themselves to make a sale. Well recent experiences have shown this to not necessarily be so…
My wife’s car was purchased in July 2008 on a three year PCP deal, which meant that in July 2011 it would be time to do something about it. She could pay the balance off as a lump sum, re-finance the balance, trade in for a new car or hand the keys back and walk away. The last option wasn’t an option as she needs a car and so the investigation began back in April as to which of the other paths to go down.
Paying the balance off as a lump sum also wasn’t going to happen and so it was a case of either re-finance it and keep the car or go down the trade-in route and start over again. A trip was made to the local dealership three months before the deadline to start the ball rolling and begin the conversations on the options open to us. It soon became apparent that the most cost effective way of proceeding was to go down the trade-in and start again route. So that was it, the decision made to spend a lot of money on a luxury item. What a pleasurable experience this was going to be – all the fun of choosing which model, specifying the options, selecting the paint finish, the interior colour and then the eager anticipation of delivery. At least that is how it should be!
Slow progress
After the initial meeting with the sales executive there was silence for a week, despite the promise of a phone call in a couple of days time. Then, after chasing him, we got a response to say he had been off ill and offering his apologies. Of course he can’t help being ill, but surely in a well established main dealer there are systems in place to make sure sales leads don’t get forgotten when staff are off ill? Seemingly not at this particular dealer. His email to us said he would be back to us with price and finance options in the next few days. Then nothing - not a peep, no email, no phone call, no letter, nothing. So we crossed that dealer off the list of companies to do business with.
Then as luck would have it, we received an invitation through the post to another dealer’s summer weekend special. Big savings on various models, a dealer supported deposit scheme only open to the VIP invitees and such like. All you need to do is respond via email to get yourself onto the guest list. So we did, and heard nothing back from them. So we replied again and another deafening silence. Then my wife got a text message from the dealership inviting her to the VIP weekend if she replied to the text. She did and heard nothing back. We decided to turn up on the day and make our efforts to register known to the staff. The receptionist was great, she apologised and said she couldn’t understand what had gone wrong, but she would get a salesman to squeeze us in for a chat in between his booked appointments. We had an initial conversation with him and told him what sort of car we were after, he said he would like to talk to us in more detail and so we made an appointment to go back. When we did return he was out and so one of his colleagues was asked to deputise.
No improvement
My wife then recalled the tale of the extremely poor service we’d had from the first dealer and the impossible task of trying to register for this particular dealer’s VIP event, to which he assured us of his undivided attention. My wife’s request was for a particular model in a certain colour and with a specific interior finish. Would he give us a price for this option? You bet he wouldn’t. He skirted round the request, talking about cars they had in the pipeline, ex-demo stock and then finally, after we expressed our frustration at the time this was taking, he said he’d come back with a price by email the next day.
By now you’ve probably guessed what happened next. No email. So we emailed him and asked him what was going on, to which he replied that the systems had been down over the weekend but he would get back to us in the next two days. Which he did, only to present us with a mail that said “Because it could potentially be a long wait for the exclusive interior it is proving difficult to sort the figures for you. I think looking at the basic model should work out OK for you.” He hadn’t got a clue.
We were furious and so emailed his boss to complain about the shoddy treatment and got no response. I then emailed the sales director to complain about both of them and still got no response. Eventually, a month later, the original sales guy emailed back to say he’d been sorting through his emails and saw my email to his boss (to which he had been copied) and wondered whether anyone had sorted us out and that he’d be happy to help! My wife’s reply to this was an understandably terse “We gave up waiting and purchased from another dealer who ordered the exact car that I wanted”. His response was to say he hopes she enjoys the car.
How on earth can two dealers, working in an industry that keeps telling us business is dreadful, turn away sales worth many thousands of pounds so readily?
The parallels with the Hi-Fi industry and the car industry are often made – luxury goods, high ticket prices, discerning clients etc. But such poor service would never happen in our industry. Would it?
My wife’s car was purchased in July 2008 on a three year PCP deal, which meant that in July 2011 it would be time to do something about it. She could pay the balance off as a lump sum, re-finance the balance, trade in for a new car or hand the keys back and walk away. The last option wasn’t an option as she needs a car and so the investigation began back in April as to which of the other paths to go down.
Paying the balance off as a lump sum also wasn’t going to happen and so it was a case of either re-finance it and keep the car or go down the trade-in route and start over again. A trip was made to the local dealership three months before the deadline to start the ball rolling and begin the conversations on the options open to us. It soon became apparent that the most cost effective way of proceeding was to go down the trade-in and start again route. So that was it, the decision made to spend a lot of money on a luxury item. What a pleasurable experience this was going to be – all the fun of choosing which model, specifying the options, selecting the paint finish, the interior colour and then the eager anticipation of delivery. At least that is how it should be!
Slow progress
After the initial meeting with the sales executive there was silence for a week, despite the promise of a phone call in a couple of days time. Then, after chasing him, we got a response to say he had been off ill and offering his apologies. Of course he can’t help being ill, but surely in a well established main dealer there are systems in place to make sure sales leads don’t get forgotten when staff are off ill? Seemingly not at this particular dealer. His email to us said he would be back to us with price and finance options in the next few days. Then nothing - not a peep, no email, no phone call, no letter, nothing. So we crossed that dealer off the list of companies to do business with.
Then as luck would have it, we received an invitation through the post to another dealer’s summer weekend special. Big savings on various models, a dealer supported deposit scheme only open to the VIP invitees and such like. All you need to do is respond via email to get yourself onto the guest list. So we did, and heard nothing back from them. So we replied again and another deafening silence. Then my wife got a text message from the dealership inviting her to the VIP weekend if she replied to the text. She did and heard nothing back. We decided to turn up on the day and make our efforts to register known to the staff. The receptionist was great, she apologised and said she couldn’t understand what had gone wrong, but she would get a salesman to squeeze us in for a chat in between his booked appointments. We had an initial conversation with him and told him what sort of car we were after, he said he would like to talk to us in more detail and so we made an appointment to go back. When we did return he was out and so one of his colleagues was asked to deputise.
No improvement
My wife then recalled the tale of the extremely poor service we’d had from the first dealer and the impossible task of trying to register for this particular dealer’s VIP event, to which he assured us of his undivided attention. My wife’s request was for a particular model in a certain colour and with a specific interior finish. Would he give us a price for this option? You bet he wouldn’t. He skirted round the request, talking about cars they had in the pipeline, ex-demo stock and then finally, after we expressed our frustration at the time this was taking, he said he’d come back with a price by email the next day.
By now you’ve probably guessed what happened next. No email. So we emailed him and asked him what was going on, to which he replied that the systems had been down over the weekend but he would get back to us in the next two days. Which he did, only to present us with a mail that said “Because it could potentially be a long wait for the exclusive interior it is proving difficult to sort the figures for you. I think looking at the basic model should work out OK for you.” He hadn’t got a clue.
We were furious and so emailed his boss to complain about the shoddy treatment and got no response. I then emailed the sales director to complain about both of them and still got no response. Eventually, a month later, the original sales guy emailed back to say he’d been sorting through his emails and saw my email to his boss (to which he had been copied) and wondered whether anyone had sorted us out and that he’d be happy to help! My wife’s reply to this was an understandably terse “We gave up waiting and purchased from another dealer who ordered the exact car that I wanted”. His response was to say he hopes she enjoys the car.
How on earth can two dealers, working in an industry that keeps telling us business is dreadful, turn away sales worth many thousands of pounds so readily?
The parallels with the Hi-Fi industry and the car industry are often made – luxury goods, high ticket prices, discerning clients etc. But such poor service would never happen in our industry. Would it?
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