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Service Exellence

Number of messages: 12

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Dave_C
Arizona, United States

what is service excellence?

1. above and beyond youe expectations
2. lifting customers expectatons thru service.
3. surpassing customers expectations.

any other ideas out there?

Posted 23 Feb 2005 12:34 AM

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Al_S
Alberta, Canada

Speaking from actual experience:

1) Repairs done correctly first time.
2) Repairs done economically.
3) Target quality repairs to last for 5 years, no patching or quick fixes.

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Alberta Forklift Safety Council Serious about safety!

Posted 25 Feb 2005 05:13 AM

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leobert_b
Makati, Philippines

to me service excellence are the three E's

E-EFFICIENT
E-EFFECTIVE
E-ECONOMICAL
....... You can have combination, but to excel means to have it all.

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Never Say Die! in every sale, life is at stake

Posted 4 Mar 2005 01:33 PM

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dale_v
California, United States

My personal opinion is that most companies don't have a clue as to what customers' expectations even are. Nowadays, expectations are sky high because people are used to doing business with companies like FedEx, Amazon.com, etc., etc. You've got to give customers something they don't expect. The question you should be asking yourself is "What am I doing differently, and what am I doing better than any other forklift service department?" If you're going to say that you exceed customers' expectations you better be prepared to back that up, and be prepared to be shocked.

-------------------------
Rom. 10:9-10

Posted 24 Jun 2005 12:14 AM

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etharp
North Carolina, United States

Are you saying "be prepared to be shocked at what the customer expects"?
why should a company like Fedex have any greater or less expectatations of customer satisfaction than a forklift sales/service company? Do the job right the first time, and expect to be paid respectably for the effort. don't "take what is you have not earned".
Fiar is fair and right is right... seems too simple to me. biggest problem is that everyone feels their own time is worth more than the next person's time.

Posted 27 Jun 2005 10:42 PM

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dale_v
California, United States

I am absolutely saying be prepared to be shocked at how high the customers' expectations really are, but your second question leads me to believe you misunderstood. Companies like FedEx DON'T have greater expectations, but they deliver and perform well beyond what most other companies do, creating the higher expectation for you and me. Doing the job right the first time doesn't cut it any longer if you're doing the exact same job any other service dept. is. What are you doing that makes your customers' service experience memorable???? Don't you think every forklift service dept. in the country would tell you that they try to do the job right the first time???? Big deal. What's that doing to create customer loyalty? Wouldn't every customer in the country EXPECT you to do the job right the first time?? Quite frankly, my time is worth more, which is why I personally refuse to wait any longer than 15 minutes ANYWHERE, i.e. Doctor's office, supermarket, etc., etc.. I wonder how the climate of business would change in this country if everyone tried that.

-------------------------
Rom. 10:9-10

Posted 5 Jul 2005 04:04 PM

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dale_v
California, United States

More Follow Up........"Fair is Fair and Right is Right". If you had a customer dispute a service bill, and you felt that you were completely in the "right" and being fair with the customer, but the customer was still upset, what would you do?? Would you force him to go to your competition because you were being fair and he wasn't? I don't think so, or at least I hope not. In Sales/Service Right and Wrong DON'T MATTER. The customer's
PERCEPTION of right and wrong is what matters.

Posted 5 Jul 2005 04:10 PM

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etharp
North Carolina, United States

I might want to input here, that customer's perceptions are something that communication/education can and should have a direct effect upon. If you do the job right (which includes communicating correctly), and stop deciding your time is more valuable than the next person's time, then the customer would have no incorrect perception.

We very often have to give news to a customer they don’t like to hear and act as though the news is wrong;
“I am sorry about the fact the motor mounts broke, but while your 15 year old son was driving that forklift, we are pretty sure he hit the building support pole right behind where the forklift sat after the motor mounts broke, and we are pretty sure the factory is not going to reimburse us for the warranty for the motor”.
Customer’s reply since he does not want to have to go to the upper management/Accounting department with a $2000.00 USD bill for a motor due to his underage son driving the forklift into the building; “there is no way that did that kind of damage, the motor MUST have been defective, I am sure dealer XXX would have covered that under Warranty”.
What is the “perception” and what is the “stated perception”? Maybe I do have to “force” this ‘customer’ to use my competition in the future, since without a profit, I might have to close the doors (and if we eat the cost of the motor to keep the customer happy, how much profit can we ever make from that customer).
Bottom line is I care more to make a profit, and so be in business next year, than to kiss up to any one that might want to prevent me (and the company I work for) from profiting for their own benifit.
Any one can sell heaters to Eskimos, but a good salesman can sell refrigerators to the same Eskimo.
The streets are lined with folks that want something for free, but they are not “customers”.
My Father used to have a saying “business is a lot like sex, you can find lots of people you can screw one time, but if you might want to do it to them a second time, you better kiss them afterwards”.
I also (if I was your customer) would object to the idea that a vendor could “force me to…”(whatever it was, including go or not go to another vendor). Customers are free to spend their money where ever they like.
Bottom line is sometimes we have to say 'no' and maybe even 'cull' our customer lists for the sake of staying in business.

Posted 5 Jul 2005 10:32 PM

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etharp
North Carolina, United States

Back to Dale's question about Fed Ex, my point was not about Fed Ex's expectations as a customer, but about the customers of FedEx’s expectations. What do FedEx’s customers expect from them that is any different (other than product) than what your customers expect from you.
Some of the points you make are extremely valid though, Forklift companies need to step up to the plate and deliver the same level of "service excellence" as what customers perceive as being delivered by FedEx (etc...) and we can get there the same way, quality control, training, critical examination of our policies and procedures, over all Communication.
Personally I don't use FedEx since they have problems delivering to residences in this part of the world (won't leave a package at a house even way out in the woods where the closest neighbor is over a mile away, so they have "forced" me to use their competition,) so to me, FedEx might not have been the best example.
I also would point out that Dale's statement of "being shocked" about what the customer expects sounds as if Dale is not already aware of what his customer expects, and so is not prepared to deliver what the customer expects, and so (no wonder) has customer relation questions. Seems to me, to be unprofessional to not be aware of what the customer expects.

Modified 5 Jul 2005 11:07 PM
by poster.

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steve_w
Texas, United States

I believe that service is much more in-depth than what meets the eye.  All of you had good points; it’s the whole dealership that must be service excellent to win their customers loyalty.

Perception is caused from all areas - If your receptionist disconnects your customers or answers with attitude it creates a bad perception.  Compound that if you bill at the end of the month all invoices your accounting and service department have created a perception that you do not have it together.

The bottom line is in order to exceed customer’s expectation the dealership need to operate ethically and efficiently.

KEY
• Service
o Trained Mechanics
o Accurate repairs
o Bill fairly (Let your customer know ahead of time) Surprise bills create bad perceptions
o Bill when the work is completed (Not at the end of the month). If you wait it creates a surprise for the end-user, send it when it’s still fresh on their mind.
o Do not bill warranty (i.e. if it takes 2 hours to figure it was warranty and the factory won’t cover it, don’t bill it)
o Explain complex bills (CSS)
o Give updates on repairs
o Follow up (Communicate)
 Hire a part time clerk to touch base with customers to see what they thought about the service, the cost, the dealership, etc….
o Put yourself in the customers shoes
• Put things in writing
o This will eliminate the he said she said issues
 Labor rate, parts discounting, response time, etc….
• THE team
o If one department passes the buck, has attitude, does not follow up, screws the end-user, the perception is the entire dealership is bad.  Dealers need vision, expectations of their staff, and hold people accountable for their actions (NOT done very often).
o I agree with the comment about name something’s that make the dealer better and different from their competition.  I have not seen any real differences in dealers. (LOOK outside the box).
o Remember if your competitor was poor in service it takes time to earn creditability, Customers get gun shy after being shot a few times.
• If someone can show me the dealer that really doe’s it correctly, I would love to hear about them.  Not many do, not that they are bad they just are complacent and do not think they need to improve or have the wrong management to fix things.

Posted 6 Jul 2005 01:56 AM

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etharp
North Carolina, United States

Great Post SteveW, I think I will print it out and keep it.
As far as dealers working "outside the box toward customer service excellence", we have setup a department and staffed it with our (previously) most experienced techs (average experience 30 years in the forklift industry), and that department has the job of "all other customer relations; Safety, Training, and Quality Assurance" etc. We do not have a CSS. The people in that department have the job of dealing with any customer less than 120% happy, and finding out who is less than 120% happy, BEFORE the customer gets the on phone and calls management.
We do still have management that are the ones who decide whom will get free NASCAR tickets, or baseball hats, or whatever we decide to "kiss" the customers with.
Most of our techs just refer to it as the "Quality" department, but the department insists on Safety to be first. This department also has the job of acting as the customer for all rental and warranty (factory or internal) repairs (no one promises warranty unless approved by the quality department, no Rental gets a high dollar repair just before it is going to be sold ‘as is’.
So far (over 1 year) management has never questioned any internal warranty authorized by the Quality Department, past getting 'in on' the problem and budget and those internal warranty repairs are down over 30% over a 2 year period, with about 12% rental fleet service cost savings (some of which may be attributable to having switched to synthetic motor and transmission oils).
We quality inspect about 70% of all shop repairs, but only about 5 to 7% of road repairs, and the road repairs are followed up on within 72 hours of completion. All follow-ups are done after giving the Customer a chance to vent or praise, and all information is brought back to management.
Any tech problems road service techs have are routed through the quality department, and any sort of repeat problems are noted and included in training, rather than single out a tech for not knowing something, we make sure all the techs have the needed information. We also blame the quality department if the techs don’t have the information they need.
The quality department is also charged with service manual library functions and laptop and service tool acquisitions and maintenances.
The personnel in the quality department are all paid hourly, and not commissions, so how much is sold is not their concern. Customer satisfaction IS.
Since the same people are charged with both operator training and Tech training, they get to know the customers operators and supervisors, from a position that is of trust, not of sales.
The techs get comfortable coming to the quality department with questions about what they _don't_ know, something many techs would refrain from with the supervisor who decides how much the next raise might be. This also frees up the service department administrative functions to work on improving process management, and not tech issues. (Like getting the billing done within 5 days of completion of the work, time is money, there too) Further, it allows the service manager to be a true manager and not the "ubber Tech", in these days when we work for a computer database.
We also do NOT have a machine answer the phones durring normal business hours, but a real person, who has the authority to answer both yes and no. (never accept 'no' for an answer from someone that does not have the authority to say 'yes')
We have a operations manager and dealer principals who are as concerned with customer satisfaction as they are with a quota. Our dealer Principal regularly picks customers at random (I think it's random) and takes the utilization printout from our fleet management database, and shows the customer's purchasing department just how much they are spending per truck/hour of operation. This works as a great sales tool, since we can then say with considerable quantifications if it's time to consider a new forklift,<

Modified 6 Jul 2005 06:13 AM
by poster.

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Dave_C
Arizona, United States

This has been great reading all these posts. I am like most people out there and would also like to work for the best dealership. The dealership I now work with, wants to be "the best in the U.S." Within our staff
we have about 30% with over 20 years and 15% with over 30 years and the rest 5 years or less. We have around 60 technicians, 20 sales, 12 parts, 4 managers, 2 supervisors and around 12 support staff. Our dealeship is usally fairly busy. Our tecnicians are extensivly trained, all have laptop computers (some with air cards), GPS in all service trucks, cell phones, credit cards to puchase parts, procedures in place to aid everyone involved from the first line Field Tech to billing the customer. Unfortunitly thats where our customer service stops. When the procedures are followed the system works great. But when they are not the customer is the one to suffer, usally in the pocket book. I have worked for this dealership for many years, have seen many managers come and go. It seems we have a managment change every couple years. The problem we have at this point is lack of respect between managment and the "People on the floor" which trickles down to the customer. I have been told by customers "the only reason they do business with us is because of a certain technian or parts person". I had to do shop repairs in the field because the customer refuses to send the job to our shop (usally prior bad shop experiance. All of this infighting is a great waste of time and effort with the customer suffering. I know I may sound negative about this but i'm possably the most positive person at this dealership. I always take care of my customers which sometimes means being a shield between the customer and the dealership. I see it as a real shame and waste that a large dealership in one of Americas largest cities can not be the best.

Posted 9 Aug 2005 02:40 PM

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