Customer ‘care’: It's becoming a car industry joke

Why is the car industry so emphatically, notoriously crap at customer care? These things are expensive, so in a sane universe you’d expect car brands to be above average looking after you. But they’re not…

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Only the car industry could retrofit the term ‘care’ to mean, in practice: ‘Not only not to give a shit about someone who spent a lot of money here, but also to take every opportunity to violate that person financially, over subsequent years.’

I got an e-mail from a dude named Jay Merola. Mr Merola owns a 2012 Mazda CX-9 with 109,000km on the clock. So - slightly below average kays. It developed what he calls a “small transmission kickdown issue from 5th to 4th”.

So he drops it off at the dealership - it’s due for a service anyway - and he picks it up at 5pm, whence he was:

“...told by the service staff that the transmission was completely shot and the car needed a new one at a cost of $18k. They recommended not to drive it but if I chose to I would have to sign a waiver.

I left it there.”

Ouch: Standard service and transmission tweak: That’ll be $18k. And if you want the car back, you must sign this document.

Pro Tip: It’s your car. You can take it any time. Never be coerced into signing any document in order to collect your own property. If they try that on: Sex and travel, if you know what I mean. 

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"They referred the matter to their locked down Melbourne Death Star leaders [Mazda head office] who basically told them and me that there was no evidence of mechanical failure.

So I had the dealer technician expert telling me the transmission was dead vs a keyboard warrior telling me there was no issue. What the…?"

EXTRA EXTRA: Mazda dealer misses opportunity to upgrade existing Mazda customer…

Nothing like getting your stories straight. Nothing like it. So, just before the Bat Pumpy came out...

"After some slightly heated discussions they took the car to an independent local transmission guy who changed the oil, reconfigured the TCU and said she was good to go."

What if he had reluctantly just said ‘OK’ and copped the $18k on the chin? Mr Merola says:

"Dealers are only interested customers as cash cows. Their business model appears to be that a slight mechanical problem needs to be ripped out and completely replaced rather than repaired/serviced.

Mazda does not service auto transmissions as part of routine servicing because it adds costs that consumers whinge about and they deem transmission oils as lifetime items - but a lifetime to a dealer is the warranty period.

I will never buy another Mazda because the after sales service is rubbish."

In a parallel universe, there’s a parallel Jay Merola in a parallel CX-9, and the parallel dealer says: “Look - we need to investigate what’s wrong with you transmission. There’s a safety dimension to this, so here’s a demonstrator CX-9 - take that home for a few days. I’d be interested to see what you think of it, because there’s been a number of enhancements over the past few years. We’ll give you a call when it’s sorted.”

In the parallel universe, of course, parallel Mr Merola buys another CX-9, later that week. He tells everyone he knows how awesome Mazda’s aftersales support was, and how amazing his new CX-9 is. 

He doesn’t get up at 6.30 on a Saturday to vent to Darth Varder’s automotive understudy about how poorly Mazda has treated him. (I get that dealerships are independent businesses, but they fly the flag, and so, to consumers, that distinction is moot, and it’s disingenuous for carmakers to claim this as evidence in mitigation. If you’re a carmaker and you’ve got a shit dealer, bone them. Easy.)

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MORE CUSTOMER CARE FAILURES

Sargent Schultz was adept at knowing "nu-sink!” too…

Ben, whose surname has been erased from history like Gone With The Wind or the Juukan Gorge rock shelters (well done, Rio Tinto, you dickheads), he presented to me a problem with his allegedly premium German SUV.

For his past life sins, Ben’s SUV in question is a 2015 Audi Q7, so he must’ve been a bit of a bastard (just saying).

And because the Q7 is a nasty, cynically trumped up Volkswagen Toureg, the brakes have started to squeal in reverse - how premium! Just like a Mercedes AMG going forward in traffic.

When this squeal began, Ben darkened the dealer’s door and they wanted $220 just to diagnose the problem. Apparently they’d never heard of the acceptable quality consumer guarantee because, hey, it’s only been legislated for about a decade.

Then they allegedly tell him this is a normal operational characteristic on this allegedly premium four-ringed shitheap. I’m pretty sure it’s not, but that’s what I hear.

As it turns out, Audi Australia’s dealers are even happy to sell Ben these clips for $120-150 each depending on the dealer, and he needs two clips obviously, because two calipers are squealing.

So, the brake pads are fine and Ben finds a bunch of lawsuits over this issue in the USA.

Apparently there’s even a reverse-engineered fix called, somewhat uncreatively, an ‘anti-squeal brake clip’ - which apparently Audi Australia is completely flying blind over.

Plus, they need $220 per hour to fit them because, hey, arseholes.

Happily, because of the interconnected web-world, there’s an American Audi dealer just outside Las Vegas in a town called Henderson who sold Ben the clips for US$19.48 for the pair. Plus about the same amount to shit them here, to the arse-end of the planet. Less than $10 each.

That’s about $60 Australian, and frankly, a politician could fit these clips, versus $680 for the Australian Arsehole Audi dealer solution.

There’s even a technical service bulletin (TSB) from Audi USA about how to deal with this squealy brake problem which Audi Australia maintains it knows nothing about. Finger on the pulse.

Of course, in fact, what they should be doing is retro-fitting their shitty 50 cent brake clips FOR FREE as part of their ongoing consumer law compliance, not to mention their apparently non-existent commitment to making their customers feel somewhat special having bought an allegedly premium product.

They really do deserve that, as a minimum.

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CUSTOMER CARE DONE RIGHT

Despite all this, here in Australia, some companies actually manage to get customer care right.

CASE #1

Rode microphones, manages to get this right. They are a great Australian company which manufactures their products here.

I talk to you via a Rode NTG-4 Plus, and I have about 15 different microphones which some might consider a sickness. And one of my three Rode Wireless Go transmitters unexpectedly crapped out recently, and as a mere entry-level customer, with my full-tilt anti-Christ reputation confined to the narrow bandwidth of the automotive industry, they wouldn’t know me from a bar of soap.

But I reached out to them, they told me to send it in, gave me a case number, told me they’re on it. What more could I ask for?

A week later they send me a brand new one.

There was no questions asked, no diagnosis fee, no spin doctors, no excuse-making or non-disclosure agreements or gag orders, no putting a gun to my warranty without a signature. None of the standard car industry malpractices.

Now think for a second…

Do I now tell everybody who wants to listen how great my Rode microphone customer care experience was? Shit yeah.

Any budding YouTuber who wants vlog-rig advice, I’ll tell them to get themselves a Rode Video Micro and Rode Wireless Go and you’ll be set, because they’re awesome.

CASE #2

You may have spotted my Onnit quad mace in recent videos, which is a rotational cross-body stabilization and core strengthening tool…from hell.

This one weighs about 11kg which isn’t much weight in the context of working out, until you put it on the end of a three-foot stick. It’s designed to crush your soul and exhaust your will to live, leaving you crush, weak and pathetic.

I had this one shipped by FedEx from the US, some 12,000km as if there weren’t even a pandemic going on, it breezes through customs where it lands with TNT, which botches the last 50kms and takes longer than the first trans-Pacific leg - and takes two cracks at it. Bonus points…they break it.

Robustly packaged by the brand selling it, an ancient Persian infantry tool which Onnit claims…

…and yet it can’t handle one swing through the FedEx-TNT shipping apparatus. Great work TNT, whose customer service has been just as emphatically shit as Mazda’s and Audi’s in the aforementioned case studies. TNT apparently doesn’t wanna know, maybe they’ll send me a bill. Perhaps breaking your shit is extra at TNT.

I couldn’t even find a replacement handle. But I email Onnit (to report the incident and suggest they change carriers), and so they can give me some technical support so I can remove the brass cap and replace the handle because I’d like to not hit the dog when the handle flies off.

A nice lady on the Onnit customer care team named Kaylee replies to my email saying they’re disappointed this all happened, and they’ll be sending me a brand new one - FOR FREE.

Again, I’m just a normal nobody half a world away - I don’t report on exercise equipment - cars is my thing, you may have noticed. I’m flat-out humbled by all this; breaking it wasn’t Onnit’s problem, they packaged it and sent it to me; it broke en route.

Am I a defacto Onnit ambassador henceforth? Hell yeah. Do I tell every person who’ll listen? Absolutely.

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CARE FACTOR

Carmakers like Mazda, Audi, Land Rover/Jaguar, Jeep, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Volvo, Ford, Volkswagen could all learn a lesson here. There is a significant, healthy return on investment on the goodwill and genuine care you show your customers, and - most importantly - your potential customers.

Getting this right doesn’t cost you anything, but the windfall can be substantial. You are fixing people’s problems, which if you have a functioning ethical compass is a great thing to do, but you are also spawning a fleet of unpaid impartial ambassadors for your brand.

Every frown you turn upside is a new brand ambassador, one you don’t have to put on a retained, who doesn’t require a photoshoot and a press release drawn up and approve by the board, and it’s not even that hard to do.

So what a great pity many carmakers in Australia and around the world still seem to think it’s okay to burn their customers by acting like FedEx or TNT.

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