Cheeky

[webleymk3]

Call from Mr T this morning..

Mrs T: “Hello. At your last service we had some recommendations for work to be done. Would you like to bring you car in for a FREE inspection to see how the parts are wearing and if the work is required now”

Me: “What was the work?”

Mrs T: “Disks and pads are wearing”

Me: “Yes, lets book that in tomorrow morning.”

Mrs T: “That’s fine.”

Me: “Great, I’ll put my winter alloys and tyres in the car, can you put those back on instead and chuck the summer ones in the boot”

Mrs T: “No problem but that will be chargeable for labour”

Me: But you’ve already got the wheels off so what’s the difference?”

Mrs T: “..... erm...... good point.

Me: “So you can do it?”

Mrs T: “There can be some come and go so if the wheels are already off so I’ll book that in too.”

Me: “Nice one!”

RESULT! Scores on the doors! Save me getting my hands dirty!

[Big Kev]

Webz min........please translate for all nationalities......

"This boy would get a piece at any door".............

[GreyRacer]

Nice result. Was that one of the city Mr. T's?

[Big Kev]

Watch it, David.....you will upset the London folk implying that city is the city.........lol.

[ALake]

And yet my toyota garage didn't want to do a warranty investigation without charging me! Customer service does seem to vary from dealership to dealership!

[GreyRacer]

Insist on completing a customer satisfaction form and fill it out accordingly.

[ALake]

TBH over the years I've got sick of fighting with this type of thing - as it stands another Toyota dealer has done it for me for free. The original one will never see me or my family buying anything from them again. I did think of complaining to Toyota directly but I'm pretty sure they won't give a toss either - customers are generally easy-come easy-go for most car manufacturers!

[GreyRacer]

My local prides itself on customer loyalty. I've bought 7 new cars and one 2nd hand from them in the last 20 years. Always had excellent after sales care and warranty work done from them. Several times they have stood my corner with Toyota UK for me, even with a full new set of alloys for my T180 and new set of shocks for one of my RAVs. Several times I've had new disc & pads under warranty.

[Big Kev]

Insist on completing a customer satisfaction form and fill it out accordingly.

Excessively correct.......then vote with yer feet A........

The hint is in their title......Cusomer Service.......didnae get any......? Toodlepip......

[Parts-King]

It's easy to say they don't care, customers come and go, that is a long way from the truth, customers who go are not directly replaced with new ones. Your dealer makes a huge financial investment taking on any franchise, the best way to keep customers is to do a good job and the vast majority do, most of the time. It's how they cope when things go wrong that counts. It could be debated all day, but those 99% who have a good relationship with their dealer are not on forums to defend them, unfortunatly, forums are full of knockers

Kingo

[ALake]

I've definitely voted with my feet! Shame there is such variation amongst dealers - it impacts on toyotas alledged reputation for customer service

[webleymk3]

This was at Western Toyota in Edinburgh.

I have to be honest they went through a really bad patch where their customer service was nothing short of God-awful, but they have recently stepped up their game and I'm genuinely becoming impressed with them. They're not cheap but I believe their prices are standard Toyota prices so they are what they are.

I have found them to be good at checking for things. This is obviously in their favour as it generates work so fair play to them, but it also give me a relative amount of confidence that the job is being done properly; so everyone's a winner, right?

I assume they're being so proactive due to low workload. Being able to book me in for the next morning is pretty unusual I would have thought!

[ALake]

Who are you calling a knocker! :D

Credit to the 'other' dealer though, for taking the opposite point of view - they now have my custom!

[Parts-King]

I assume they're being so proactive due to low workload. Being able to book me in for the next morning is pretty unusual I would have thought!

Probably not, but possible. We have a "floater" techie who does not have much work booked to him, he is able to help others on over running jobs and to handle any drop in's. They might have had a few slots they wanted to fill, and were selecting some customers who were on their contact list. When a jobcard is invoiced, there will be a facility to make a future contact, if somebody suggested the pads needed inspecting in 6 months, then a flag is raised on your customer record and the call should happen in 6 months, its the way it should work!

You were being called back for a visual inspection I would think, without removing the wheels

Dealers prices do vary, except for the fixed price service and repairs, they are fixed nationally

Kingo

[webleymk3]

I assume they're being so proactive due to low workload. Being able to book me in for the next morning is pretty unusual I would have thought!

Probably not, but possible. We have a "floater" techie who does not have much work booked to him, he is able to help others on over running jobs and to handle any drop in's. They might have had a few slots they wanted to fill, and were selecting some customers who were on their contact list. When a jobcard is invoiced, there will be a facility to make a future contact, if somebody suggested the pads needed inspecting in 6 months, then a flag is raised on your customer record and the call should happen in 6 months, its the way it should work!

You were being called back for a visual inspection I would think, without removing the wheels

Dealers prices do vary, except for the fixed price service and repairs, they are fixed nationally

Kingo

Called the dealer back as i made an ar$e of my dates. On speaking to the service manager he advised it will be a visual with wheels on however for £12-£15 he'd change the wheels.

Besides, saves me bugger the shocks like i did last time I changed them....

[Parts-King]

Thought so................for that price you cannot argue......can you?

[ALake]

£12-£15 - why the vagueness, is it dependent on the number of wheels he finds on the car!?

[Big Kev]

How could you have damaged that or any shocker, Webzmin, unless you jacked it up BY the shocker........?

[Parts-King]

£12-£15 - why the vagueness, is it dependent on the number of wheels he finds on the car!?

£12.50 plus VAT = £15.00 ;)

[ALake]

Ha! I should have guessed that! Still, £3.125 per wheel is an odd amount...

[Parts-King]

Who knows More likely to just be a time x labour figure, rather than indivdual wheel basis................still cheap though

Kingo

[webleymk3]

Who knows More likely to just be a time x labour figure, rather than indivdual wheel basis................still cheap though

Kingo

Spot on. He said

"it should be about 15 minutes or so at about £15... maybe £12... it won't be much"

[Parts-King]

I think I'm in need of another star

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

[three5]

........ It's how they cope when things go wrong that counts.......

Kingo

Totally agree Kingo. It's a 70 mile round trip to the dealer that I use ( where I bought the car ). Other that making a mess of the end of my filter housing they have been pretty good - especially responsive when they changed the engine. I've dealt with very few dealers over the years. The best one was the Isuzu dealer but Toyota come a fairly close second in front of Peugeot and Suzuki.

[Hoovie]

£15 to change the wheels? Ya lazy bugger!

I did the winter tyre swap on two of our cars today. Probably took 90 mins in total and that would have cost me £30 then. Think I'll stick to getting me hands dirty (except I wore gloves :) )

Edit: should explain that 90mins included getting the wheels out of storage, swapping them, cleaning the old 'uns and putting those back into storage ;)