What does it take?

Go get a drink, this one might take a while to read…

My wife's father used to work for one of the Big 3 automakers before he died many years ago. As his survivors, my wife used to get a discount and so she, and then we, bought cars from that manufacturer (I'll abbreviate BCC – Big Car Company). Then, a couple of year ago, BCC decided that due to her father's divorce a couple of years before he died, my wife was no longer eligible for the discount (after 20-some odd years of her family using that same discount including on the one my wife was driving at the time of our purchase attempt!). Though frustrating at the time, we simply used my employer's slightly less generous discount and bought a car from BCC anyway.

Fast forward a few years. That vehicle we purchased has now had at least five brake-related repairs (the latest just last week!), two transmission issues (including an entire replacement), and several other much more minor issues. The car does not yet have 60k miles on it! To me that's a little excessive.

The most recent issue is just the icing on the proverbial cake. Last Saturday, the family was shopping a half hour from home. When we returned to our vehicle to leave, the car started fine then, after about 50 feet, stalled. Restarting the car, the engine ran extremely rough, then stalled again as we tried to move forward. We also lost transmission control – no forward and no reverse – intermittently. These were the same symptoms that my wife experienced last year when they ended up replacing the transmission. We called a tow truck and had the car towed to the same dealership that did the replacement last summer, expecting them to find additional transmission issues, and made some short-term alternate transportation arrangements.

When I heard from the dealership on Monday (I had to call them, by the way), they said that the processor, the brains of the engine, was submerged in water and that was what was causing the issues. The transmission was a symptomatic casualty, but not the root cause. They had no idea where the water came from (it had rained the night before, but we had driven in the rain many times since purchasing the van). They could offer no reasonable source of the water. Had I driven the van through a puddle 5 feet deep? No. Had I been in an accident with the vehicle? No. Had I poured 25 glasses of water down a channel that didn't exist into a cavity I couldn't reach in the firewall between the passenger compartment and the engine? Uh, not that I can remember…

Two questions pop out here. One, the more obvious one, "Where did the water come from?" and two, "If there is an electrical component susceptible to water damage, why wasn't it sealed to protect it from that water?" Answers: "Don't know" and "no water should've been able to get in there."

Having JUST gotten the vehicle back from the brake repair LESS THAN A WEEK BEFORE THIS, my irritation level was understandably a little higher than baseline when this issue presented itself.

This just doesn't make sense. I was getting no help from the dealership, so I escalated. I escalated at the dealership and had the distinct pleasure of talking to someone their website identifies as their "Customer Relations Manager" who is not someone who should even be allowed to talk to customers. I eventually talked to the Service Manager. Same crap! So I escalated to the Manufacturer's Customer Service department. Not sure why I expected anything other than just some call center phone jockey who'd give me the corporate line and toss me to the curb, but I had hopes…that were dashed. No satisfaction there either.

Meanwhile, my short-term alternate transportation arrangements had expired and I was out of options, so I paid the $340 labor costs so that I'd get my car back and vowed to continue fighting for remediation through channels other than the dealership. (The dealership's resolution? Seal the whole housing with silicone and wrap it in a plastic bag, then reattach to firewall. Now I'm concerned about lack of circulation for an electronic component as well!) I did ask the Service manager to escalate through his channels to express my concern over the lack of true resolution to this issue. He confirmed that he had done so, but the technician was on vacation this week… Did I mention that I did the same thing JUST LAST WEEK after the FIFTH brake-related repair? Different dealerships, different tech escalations, but now there should be TWO people looking into this vehicle.

So… that's just the background; it's not really what I wanted to talk about here, but I'll post updates to this saga as something happens – hopefully next week. What I wanted to talk about was customer service. You know, servicing the customer, hopefully with the intention of keeping them as a customer and selling them more product so that the company makes more money… I think that's still the goal of every capitalist company in the world.

Common sense reasons, and surveys prove, that it takes a lot more money to win a new customer than to keep an existing one. Most surveys put it at a five to seven fold difference. To KEEP one customer would cost you say $20, but to replace that customer would cost you $100-$140 dollars. But those are the numbers of video stores, and florists, and moving up to ISPs and cell carriers (both also blind to this apparent "new-fangled concept"), not the range of dollars that losing a customer means to an auto manufacturer. Total sales to one customer alone could reach half a million dollars or more over their lifetime. Granted, sales does not equal profit, but it's an important number all the same to demonstrate scale. And that doesn't even touch on the word of mouth marketing impact a bad experience can have. I can't find the study, and it was probably done before the advent of blogs (like this), and all of the other social networking phenomena, but it said that for every bad customer experience, the average person is likely to tell about 20 people versus just a couple about a positive experience. That can only be worse for the manufacturer nowadays. I've tried to praise the positive companies by name here, while protecting the names (or me from lawsuits) of the outcast.

Think of the positive, FREE publicity that this (or any) manufacturer could get if they just did the little things for their customers in situations like mine. Say they're sorry. Offer a discount on the service. Prove to me that they recorded the issue to the development team to review. ANYTHING! But nothing yet for me.

Most large companies have their share of ACMESUCKS.com websites. Do they troll those and try to win customers who post there back? I don't know, but by then, it may be too late. I'm willing to offer feedback. I'm willing to provide details and work with them to rectify this issue. I've opened the doors for them and invited them in. Others may have just walked away, told all their friends and relatives and BCC would never know what happened, not gotten the opportunity to fix things and make them right. When something like this comes up, I feel it's my responsibility to tell the company. Then my duty is done. How they react is up to them. If I don't tell them, it's my fault. If they don't fix the issue, it's their fault.

Did I mention that I actually work at a BCC facility and have to walk by their internal marketing about the quality gains that they've made, and the posters that say "We're the voice of the customer."? Talk about salt in the wound. Great -- their new cars are top of the line quality. What would make me want to buy one if they treat me like I've been treated in the last several weeks. And, so what about the new cars. What about the ones that millions of us already own? Don't they care about US? My coworkers (as employees of BCC) have said that they're embarrassed by how I've been treated (and they've only heard some of the phone conversations).

I've been fighting off the comments by friends and relatives every time something goes wrong with either of my BCC vehicles (yes, I own two currently). The ones that take the BCC name and make up new meanings for acronyms, etc. (think Northworst Airlines instead of Northwest Airlines as an example). It's getting harder and harder to defend that position now. Other members of my family are driving "other branded" vehicles with over 250,000 miles on them – no issues – or getting 50 miles to the gallon as the price of gas approaches $4/gal. I get reminded of that quite often -- especially during vulnerable times like this. I had even changed my wife's ringtone to play one of BCC's classic commercials when I called (but I've now changed it back to my son announcing my call instead).

I was planning on replacing my van this fall (if it makes it that long). I had a BCC vehicle all picked as a top contender, with really nothing else in the lineup. I'd talked to coworkers who have that same model. I'd found the support forums and looked at BCC's model site. Discount aside, I was still interested in purchasing a BCC vehicle. Of course that was two weeks ago; the feeling is waning. I'm not a lost customer yet, though. They've got another couple of weeks to win me back. The ball's in BCC's court. They need to decide how much they want me as a customer. Is it quicker, cheaper and better for them in the long run to rectify the situation now and earn my goodwill, or to continue to battle the failing auto market because they're losing customers? Their choice.

What do you think? Has anyone provided great customer service to you? Especially in the automotive world? Leave a comment and let me know. One never knows when one might need such advice…