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When do you put your foot down and say enough is enough with a customer?


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Curious on how you guys feel about appeasing certain customers.

 

As a general policy we go through great lengths for our clients when they are unhappy in the form of free services and sometimes parts depending on the situation. We are very conscious of customer's expectations and putting ourselves in their shoes to make sure that at the end of the day they felt like they were taken care of.

 

One thing I do not stand for is customers being complete jerk offs to my staff. If you come into my business and treat people with no respect then all bets are off. Even at the cost of a bad review that's where I put my foot down.

 

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I think Joe wrote an article a while back about a customer being rude to one of his service advisors. Anyway, I'd say definitely stand up for your employees! First, there is no excuse for someone to be like that to an employee. Second, I think your entire staff is probably watching how you handle the situation. If you don't have their back, I would I think you risk losing their loyalty and respect. Good employees are hard enough to find, the last thing you want is a rude customer running them off.

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We call those customers 1 % 's . They do not fit our morals valves etc... We bend over backwards to keep customers happy . But their is a very small percentage you should avoid. I believe direct unemotional communication is the best defense. Sorry we are not the shop for you if you want to supply your own parts.... haggle the price after you agreed to the estimate. nice to meet you , though have a nice life!

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  • 4 months later...

A little late to the convo but we dont believe in "The customer is always right"---it simply is not always true.

We hold our customers on the same level as our employees. Both are vital to our success. If a customer is wrong, we'll let them know and if we have to, we stick up for our employee. If the employee is wrong, we make it right with the customer. 

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  • Have you checked out Joe's Latest Blog?

         5 comments
      I recently spoke with a friend of mine who owns a large general repair shop in the Midwest. His father founded the business in 1975. He was telling me that although he’s busy, he’s also very frustrated. When I probed him more about his frustrations, he said that it’s hard to find qualified technicians. My friend employs four technicians and is looking to hire two more. I then asked him, “How long does a technician last working for you.” He looked puzzled and replied, “I never really thought about that, but I can tell that except for one tech, most technicians don’t last working for me longer than a few years.”
      Judging from personal experience as a shop owner and from what I know about the auto repair industry, I can tell you that other than a few exceptions, the turnover rate for technicians in our industry is too high. This makes me think, do we have a technician shortage or a retention problem? Have we done the best we can over the decades to provide great pay plans, benefits packages, great work environments, and the right culture to ensure that the techs we have stay with us?
      Finding and hiring qualified automotive technicians is not a new phenomenon. This problem has been around for as long as I can remember. While we do need to attract people to our industry and provide the necessary training and mentorship, we also need to focus on retention. Having a revolving door and needing to hire techs every few years or so costs your company money. Big money! And that revolving door may be a sign of an even bigger issue: poor leadership, and poor employee management skills.
      Here’s one more thing to consider, for the most part, technicians don’t leave one job to start a new career, they leave one shop as a technician to become a technician at another shop. The reasons why they leave can be debated, but there is one fact that we cannot deny, people don’t quit the company they work for, they usually leave because of the boss or manager they work for.
      Put yourselves in the shoes of your employees. Do you have a workplace that communicates, “We appreciate you and want you to stay!”
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