ClioSport.net
Register a free account today to become a member!
Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!
-
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Read more here.
Im also a complete illiterate.
What would be useful is if everyone who has had a problem with renault aftercare post it here. We can enclose these individual comments with an overview letter. It might shake them up a bit if they have say 50 letters. Ill start:
----------
I am generally unsatisfied with the service at Whitehouse Renault Bexleyheath. Staff knowledge about the cars is poor, in fact on every enquiry i make, i seem to know more! Behavior has so far also been unacceptable, a person at the aftersales desk ignored me for 10 minutes whilst on the phone to somebody, it is common courtey to pause and let customers know how long they will have to wait and what the circumstances are. The problem i was enquiring about was that my car had no engine cover or oil cap. The person i was speaking to found the engine cover had fallen deep inside the engine compartment He was keen to make negative comments about another dealership id taken the car to for an oil change as they didnt find the cover instead of giving a reason why the problem had occured. I then informed the person that i needed my car to be checked over for other niggling faults but made it clear that he was keen to get home, as instead of making me an appointment he told me to make an appointment myself the following week.
Obviously id tidy this up but it would be good if everyone did a similar sort of thing. Im worried that Renault would blame the franchise, even though renault bexleyheath have one some kind of award for their service!
Tom
ClioSport Club Member
EV (s)
Mine would also go
am generally unsatisfied with the service at Renault Enfield. Staff knowledge about the cars is poor, in fact on every enquiry i make, i seem to know more! Behavior has so far also been unacceptable, a person at the aftersales desk ignored me for 20 minutes whilst on the phone to somebody, it is common courtey to pause and let customers know how long they will have to wait and what the circumstances are. The problem i was enquiring about was that my car had no hand brake or seat release. The person i was speaking to He was keen to make negative comments about my car I then informed the person that i needed my car to be checked over for other niggling faults but made it clear that he was keen to get home, as instead of making me an appointment he told me to make an appointment myself the following week.
also the kept the car for TWO days to adjust the handbrake
w**kers
Audi TT Stronic
I cant really complain to much about my renault dealer yet.. The only thing they have failed to fix was the knocking noise, which I am going to look at myself as soon as I find the radio code.
What I dont understand though is how they can check all the engine mounts without removing the battery. Because when I got the car back after them having a look I didnt need to put the radio code in or reset the auto headlights.
When I put the car in to get the aircon fixed I had to put the code in and reset the lights.
hmm.. maybe they didnt even bother looking. They werent interested in coming out in the car with me so I could show them the problem, there solution was "dont wheelspin it" which is basically like saying "thanks for buying a 172 unfortunatly you will only be able to put your foot 1/3 of the way down on the throttle so technically buying a 072"
I agree, you can compain all you want but they wont change anything unless sales are directly affected. Even then as with my company most people dont understand the value of good customer service. If the right guy in a position of power knows your feelings then something may get done - the likelyhood is that guy will never know. I deal with the customer service at my branch and I have to be amongst the everyday husstle and bussle to find anything out - the staff wont tell you if they are mailto:cr@p">cr@p, most managers etc sit in a office and assume everything is hunky-dory. Also you are a v. v. small minority, and you will get a reply telling you that aswell
To be honest with you guys i think that if you are not happy with the service you recieve then you, are better off writting to the sales manager of the branch concerned.
As for radio codes and auto lights, they should always be corrected before the customer gets their car back. All Radio codes are stored on the Renault central computer, which every Renault dealers service department use. So its possible that they have carried out the checks and input the radio code for you.
The people who are moaning about, the perception that all the technitions in the workshop, just wanna rag the arse off your cars are deluded. These guys are working on every Renault of every kind day in and day out. Why the fook would they wanna waste time taking a trip out in your car. They have better things to do like complete other repairs. They all only get paid on the number of hours they complete. Besides most of em get to go to track days and rag the arse off Renaults own cars.
I really get tired of people moaning about the service they recieve. Do you ever write and thank em when they have done a good job for you ?? I think proberly not !! Its just easier to b**ch about the time when things dont go your way !!
Tell me this, dont you ever have a bad day at work and feel like you wanna just put something off until tomorrow ?? We aint all perfect and lets face it we all have bad days.
I dont suppose that this reply is gonna make me any friends but i feel that my opinion counts too.
Clio II 1.4 Priveleg
At a busy dealership we see up to 50 customers a day. Most customers turn up all at the same time, normally between 8 AM - 9AM.
This puts the receptionist under a great deal of pressure. The customer THINKS they are the only one with thier car booked in on that day.
Each of those 50 cars has to be put through the workshop for repair/service/diagnosis.
The workshop controller issues the jobs. The technicians work on the cars. The parts guys look up the parts. Then the receptionist has to contact these 50 customers at some point during the day with updates or to gain authority to proceed.
Once all the jobs have been completed, 50 invoices have to be prepared.
Then the 50 customers all turn up at the same time to collect thier cars! 4PM - 6PM
Its just the way service departments operate and it is far from perfect. Its not anyones particular fault but things do go wrong. Nobody at the dealership I work at, deliberately goes out of thier way to upset the customers.
The product is not without its faults, some known problems are easy to fix, its the ones we havent come across before that take the time.
Service times keep getting cut back so we have to book more cars in each day to fully load the workshop. That is controlled by Renault and not the dealers.
Well I have had my rant. Just thought youd like to see it from the other side of the fence.
Bob
Bob
You are spot on mate !! I couldnt have put it better myself. The busiest department in any dealership. is the service department.
Not only do they have to sort all the customers jobs, they also have all the new cars to pdi and road test, all the used cars to prepare. You guys have it tough, coz the new car customers want their cars asap and the used car customers want theirs asap and then you have the service customers who want theirs asap. So you have to juggle everything and try to keep everyone happy.
Then you have got the salesman hassling you to do just one more pdi before you go home. So he can keep his customer happy.
Dont envy you one bit !!
Clio II 1.4 Priveleg
Thanks for your understanding Leigh. I didnt include sales cars new/used or the copious quantity of "Drop on jobs". These are jobs that just turn up for us to just look at! The worst offenders are company reps with thier fleet cars. "Got a brake light bulb out, stick one in for us, while I wait!!!!" They are either too tight or lazy to buy a 59P bulb and fit it themselves. This entails the receptionist raising a job card. Then they have to find the overworked workshop controller (ME!) I then have to take a technician off of SOMEONE ELSES car so they can fit a 59P bulb. The receptionist then has to phone the lease company (that can take up to an hour) to get authority. Then the job has to be invoiced.
These are the everyday frustrations that we have to cope with.
Its hard to smile somedays!
Bob, overworked but paid very well! (NOT)
Its also frustrating for paying customers who get their cars back unserviced, get left waiting in reception for hours when the car is already fixed, get idiotic parking attendent interrogating them about exactly what they want before they can park and finally it is very VERY frustrating having to pay through the nose for this so called service.
Im not tarring all Reanult dealers with the same brush, but after 5 years of using Renaults, I have never once been satisfied with the service that Reg Vardy Renault have to offer.
I totally understand Leigh and Bobs comments - customers can be frustrating, but when it comes down to it, customers pay the wages and therefore it pays to look after them and not treat them like idiots (which is certainly what Vardys do). I think Renault should take action against poor dealerships like Vardys....however, I do personally send "thankyou" e-mails when I feel I have received good service (although Ive never sent one to Renault!)
Rhys
Bob
Working 4 Renault for seven years has given my the expierence to know exactly where your coming from !! Oh and by the way Im one of those anoying salesmen who come and chase you up !! With questions like whens that pdi gonna be ready and the customers on the way can you pdi it coz. He has changed his mind about picking it up on friday and wants it now !! Otherwise he says hell cancel the order. (like hell get one elsewhere the same day ).
Paying through the nose for service work ?? Well a sevice every 18000 or 12000 miles aint expensive is it !! Try owning a bmw or a landrover and see what their basic services cost !! Twice as much at least and for the same work done, that takes the same time.
Its not so much that they are overworked, its more to do with customers thinking that they are the only one who has got their car in for work that day. How often does someone say " oh my brakes are squekng, and it must be sorted out today, because im getting anoyed by it " Can you sqeeze it in today"
Sometimes you find that a car is not finished on time due to a car that was in for a diagnostic check for a unknown problem, has taken a lot longer to finish . Due to the investigation taking longer to find the problem, than it takes to fix it. Oh and that was in before your one and oh dear yours has been delayed. Or parts are needed that arent stock items and they need to be ordered.
Sorry guys we aint perfect but we fooking try hard to please everybody.
Dont forget that most dealerships will have to prepare about 70 new cars each month and about 50 used ones. Then you have the busy months March and sept where they will do about 250 new cars and 120 used cars . Also coz people bought there car in sept or march they decide that it must be serviced in those months as well. So lets be a little more understanding eh !!
If Renault wanted to be really sh*tty they could say that you have invalidated your warranty by fitting modifications to your cars. Lets face it most dealerships turn a blind eye.
Shiny red R32
Rob
I have corrected your spellings etc for you, as you suggested above!!
"I am generally unsatisfied with the standard of service at Whitehouse Renault Bexleyheath. Staff knowledge about the cars is poor, in fact for every enquiry I make, I seem to know more than they do! Behaviour has so far also been unacceptable, a person at the after-sales desk ignored me for ten minutes whilst he was on the phone to somebody else. It is common courtesy to pause, and let customers know how long they will have to wait and what the circumstances are. The problem I was enquiring about, was that my car had no engine cover or oil cap. The person I was speaking to, found the engine cover had fallen deep inside the engine compartment.
He was keen to make negative comments about another dealership I had taken the car to for an oil change, as they didn’t find the cover, instead of giving a reason why the problem had occurred. I then informed the person that I needed my car to be checked over for other niggling faults, but he made it clear that he was keen to get home, so instead of making me an appointment at that time, he told me to make an appointment myself the following week".
Obviously I would tidy this up, but it would be good if everyone did a similar sort of thing. I’m worried that Renault would blame the franchise, even though Renault Bexleyheath has won some kind of award for their service!
Clio II 1.4 Priveleg
Leigh, you are a salesman, you are not annoying. You, like us in the service department, have a job to do and we all do it to the best of our ability. We all work as a team to achieve a common goal. CUSTOMER SATISFACTION.
Its the customers that need to be gently educated in the workings of a busy dealership. We all try so hard to do the right and best thing but even the best plans sometimes go awry!
In a perfect world nobody would moan or expect the miracles we are to perform every day.
As this seems to be another sl*gging off session of Renault Dealers, perhaps other members/forum users could enlighten us of thier everyday hassles in thier jobs. Surely, we cant be the only trade that MAKE mistakes????? When things do go wrong, at least we try and resolve them amiably.
Comments please.
Bob
Bob - I work for a major high street electrical retailer (no names mentioned!) and things go wrong all the time, we dont treat our customers with the respect they deserve and the sales and share price are currently reflecting this. When I worked directly for the Customer Services department, i could see what the company was doing wrong, but unable to change anything about it in my lowly position.
Customers vote with their wallets. There are clearly issues with some Renault dealerships as the topic crops up loads on here, and I dont think it can always be put down to unreasonable expectations from customers. I have voted with my wallet and I will not go near Renault dealerships with my car any more. Ive been messed around enough and charged plenty for it and Im no longer prepared to put up with it. Likewise, my companys customers will go elsewhere until we start providing better goods and services.
Oh yeah, by "paying through the nose", I mean things like being charged £25 for an alloy wheel hub cap remover (a little bit of plastic with some metal prongs!) after spending 30 minutes pointing at the hubs in question trying to explain I would like a tool to remove it
(It took four showroom staff to figure out which part I needed....hence the £25 charge?!?!)Rhys
Shiny red R32
Quote: Originally posted by BobRTE on 13 February 2003
At a busy dealership we see up to 50 customers a day. Most customers turn up all at the same time, normally between 8 AM - 9AM. This puts the receptionist under a great deal of pressure. The customer THINKS they are the only one with thier car booked in on that day, then the 50 customers all turn up at the same time to collect their cars! 4PM - 6PM
Service times keep getting cut back so we have to book more cars in each day to fully load the workshop. That is controlled by Renault and not the dealers.
I think that dealer problems are worsened through them having too many "targets" to meet and mechanics having to complete a certain number of services each day causing them to be overloaded with too many bookings, which, lets face it, often leads to certain areas of the services getting missed out, due to shortage of time.
I have heard of cases where cars have supposed to have been serviced, WHEN THEY HAVE NEVER EVEN MOVED AN INCH from where they were left in the morning!!
Personally I agree with Quentin Wilson, who prefers a good, honest thorough independent garage, who values your custom and where you actually get to speak directly to the technician working on your car and where they are much more thorough because they book in the number of cars they can actually cope with.
Quentin even calls dealers Ali Baba and the 40 thieves and I can remember him running an item about dealers/services etc a while back on Top Gear, by setting up some dealers with services, having left penny coins on tyres. On collecting the serviced cars, the researchers found the pennies still sitting on the tyres!!
Talking of PDIs - we have had several new cars which have obviously not had thorough - if at all - PDIs. Vauxhall are pretty bad and two Calibras and a Cavalier GSi were the worst, a V6 Calibra didnt even have its alarm working, the electric roof wouldnt open, it had over spray on a tyre and side window, where it had obviously had to have a panel re-painted. Another Calibra had to have a new engine through numerous faults, scrathed paintwork, the passenger seat wouldnt budge -I could go on!!
More recently we have got to know a Vauxhall dealer principal socially, who tells us that they often skip PDIs at change of reg time, when they sell most cars. He said that it takes up less time by waiting until a customer finds a fault and has to book it in to be sorted!! Shocking practice when we pay over the odds for our cars!!
Leigh, Bob RTE - I appreciate your keeness to defend yourselves but personally i dont agree. The difference between renault and say, VW is that they are willing to make it a personal service, to go the extra mile. With renault they make it all too obvious that all they want is your money.
It all reminds me of public sector working environments, the workers dont care, the managers dont care because they dont face direct consequences of poor service. There is no accreditation (or at least good enough) going on, which isnt going to change as at the end of the day, the cars sell themselves, its only when renault produce crap cars that theyll get crap sales.
Another problem i forgot to mention was upon delivery where i had to send the car to get fixed straight away because it wasnt checked properly. The dealer clearly wanted to get rid of the car and pass the consquences onto the renault repairer on a different site, who did the grand total of cleaning my wheels and not repairing anything !!
Anyway, i have posted on here before commending Smiths Renault in Peterborough who supplied a great service but overall im not happy, which is what this is all about.
-Rob
Tom
ClioSport Club Member
EV (s)
i also understand the busy lives of dealers
but think how much more money they would make if they had enough staff to deal with the problems
of course there are lots (maybe?) of dealers that are great
Im not happy with My Home dealer because they are rubbish.
The one im using now - waters of st albans are good they have taken the mistakes made by enfield and got on with sorting them apart from a pointless phone call (better than nothing!) they have been great so far
Bob/leigh you must work in the service dept or within renault- do they ever ask you what you think could be done to improve service?
i know they ask me regularly but they never do anything about it.
its attention to detail that lets them down, I had my temp sensor replaced today it took half an hour, great
, but on closer examination the wire has partly been left hanging out of the bottom of the wing mirror one little anoying factor just been replaced by another!! oh, and they ordered the wrong part even when I had shown them exactly what a washerball was!!??
so the result; went in with two problems, came out with two problems....I had a laguna alarm fitted to my car, after a week the wires fell out from underneath the glovebox so i took it to the dealership, wasnt expecting anything special, just some tape to hold it all. All the fat prick of a mechanic did was tuck it back up there, as it was hanging loose again the next day!
Here are my thoughts,
Create a questionnaire that would be sent via e-mail to all club members, also this can be posted on a web page for non-members to contribute. The document should contain member id, Renault garage in question, date of last visit then comments both good and bad. The document should also provide a breakdown of the garages services so members can comment on each of them. For example sales, parts dept, accident repairs, customer service and technicians.
Once the survey has been completed the club can then approach Renault with facts & figures. This is much stronger an argument than gripes and moans, would also highlight bad Renault dealers with proof of sub standard customer service.
A new page could then be created on a web page listing all the good and bad garages, then member’s comments in each case. The club should then target the garages that members report are good for discounts on service and parts.
In my own experience Renault Croydon Coulsdon branch have excelled in resolving the problems with my Clio Sport that are many. On the other hand I would advise members to avoid Renault Bodymatters for accident repairs. On two separate jobs they did not fit the original parts or they failed to fit the parts at all but still charged me for them.
Clio II 1.4 Priveleg
Tom.
Leigh & I are small fish in a big pond. Our opinions would be like a drop in the ocean.
At the dealership I work at, we hold monthly meetings to discuss our CSI (customer satisfaction index) This is a tool that Renault use to gauge our customers satifaction. RUK use a company to phone customers who have been to our respective dealerships and ask them several leading questions. Its all based on "were you completely satisfied with this, that and the other"
If the customers are NOT COMPLETELY SATISFIED WITH ANY ASPECT OF THIER VISIT, then we are scored accordingly.
These scores are like the school league tables and we can see where we are in comparison to other dealers in our area.
We are also able to view the comments made by the customers so we can get a better understanding of what they are unhappy about and hopefully rectify these concerns.
Some comments are justified and some are not. But, if the customer is not completely satisfied, we are marked down. This can have a very serious financial penalty on the dealership, loosing several thousands pounds of bonuses that we earn by selling the product in the first place. The dealers do not make the product, only sell them! Why do you go to your dealer? Coz the product has gone wrong?
We are also monitored on other areas that also attract a financial penalty if we dont get it right.
CSi (Have explained this one)
Fundamentals (Having the dealership configured to Renaults exacting standards)
Rate of return (Customers that have to return to the dealership for whatever reason)
Right first time (making sure we have the right parts available for when the car arrives at the dealership) This is very in depth, so I wont even begin to explain this!
We strive to make YOUR visit as pleasant as possible and to deliver the best service we can.
You cant please all the people all the time.
Our lowest score is always regarding parking. We are a garage - we do not own a multi-storey car park. 50 booked cars per day, all the used vehicles on display, demo vehicles, people turning up to look at new/used cars, people turning up to buy parts, etc. They are not completely satisfied because they have nowhere to park!!!!!!!! We get penalised for this!!!
So, we DO TRY to make it as painless as possible, but some days its an uphill struggle!
Can you honestly say that you are COMPLETELY SATISFIED with the service you recieve from ANY company regardless of their trade?????
Well, that was a long rant, but I do care about customers and wish I had a magic wand to put everything right, but I havent.
PS the idea of a survey on a web site would be a very good start.
Bob
Bob
You have said all thta i was gonna say !! So ill leave it at that.
All i can say is that most people ore happy with the service they recieve. If they werent they wouldnt come back and buy more cars and recommend them to their friend/familys.
I have many customers who have bought cars from me and then bought their sons/ daughters and friends to me because they recieved a friendly proffesional service. Many customers have also switched from the branch that i used to work at and come to the dealership that i now work at. If thats not a sign of customer satisfaction then i dont now what is !!
As I think I said earlier on another post, it is usually the people and not the product that is the problem. Service provided by some members of staff I work with is terrible but it is usually down to training and motyivation of the individaul. They have to know what they are talking about and they have to care.
My local renault dealer seems to employ a lot of people that are have one or both of these characteristics missing. This is not the fault of the customer but the management/running of this dealership.
Its funny how you cant get advice as to what bulb is required for a dashboard. Does this not show on the fancy computers, part programmes and microfishes? And its also funny how fault cannot be found at this dealership but when taking your car to another dealer 10 miles away these faults are found straight away and rectified.
I always give credit where credit is due and would praise good service yet I cannot at my local Renault dealer. But then again nor can I at my local Sainsburys, Burger King, McDonalds who are crap also.
