Don’t Coach Me on how to Answer your Stupid Survey
March 21, 2007 – 9:39 am by Matt Radel
Filed under Rants
Ohhhh boy….this fires me up.
I just got some work done on my Golf yesterday – my 50k, a headlight replacement as well as the tail light switch recall. Everything has been satisfactory for the past 24 hours, I have no real complaints (other than it may have taken a shade longer than I thought it should). Everyone was pleasant, and aside from forking over a decent amount of cash, it wasn’t a very painful experience.
And now my service guy calls today to make sure everything went smoothly, and all is working as expected. Initially, I’m pleasantly surprised. They are making more of an effort to take care of customers. They want to do things right. Then he informs me that I might be contacted to complete a survey about VW customer service, and any “yeses or tens would be greatly appreciated”.
This is one reason I left Toyota. Don’t tell me what to say. Don’t coach me on how to fill out your surveys to make it appear that you did your job. I’m not going to answer any better because you asked me to do so. And don’t try to casually sneak that in at the end of a call that appears to be a checkup on my experience.
Don’t get me wrong. I think VW’s heart is in the right place, that they want to take care of folks(they also just raised the labor rates at my dealership. it used to be $74 an hour, now it’s $79. I hope that means they gave their folks a raise). I mean, let’s face it – I can get my work done elsewhere. That money doesn’t HAVE to go into VW’s pocket. It’s in their best interest to kiss my ass and make sure that I keep coming back to them.
But please don’t coach me on how I can make your life easier. The burden is on you to provide the service I expect. The burden of explaining the survey is on the folks who run it. Give me a little credit. If I’m happy, I’ll tell the survey folks I am. Period.
Don’t Coach Me on how to Answer your Stupid Survey
March 21, 2007 – 9:39 am by Matt Radel
Mrad, you might want to consider cutting your VW dealer a little break. Many customers will say everything is ok at the time of pickup but once they get home, their opinion could change or another problem could arise. Dealers are weighted heavy on their customer surveys, many VW dealers base their employee pay checks on the customer survey scores. Another problem; many people do not know exactly how to fill out the surveys correctly nor do they understand the importance they carry for the dealer. Maybe the dealer could go about a different way in asking for “yes’s” but I would be happy if a dealer called me to be sure that my service was good and to say “hey..please don’t forget to give a good rating on the survey and if anything changes between now and the time you receive the survey, please call me”.
As for shop labor rates being on the rise..we may as well get used to this. Since the internet, customers know what dealers pay for their vehicles and they are making less and less in the sales departments..so you know what that means!! Dealers have to make money somehow and the service department is where they make most of it now.
-Jeff
I agree with you on just about every point Jeff. As you stated, there could be a different way that they phrase how they ask for our ratings. Maybe they suggest that we give our most honest opinion, rather than pushing only the best rating and yes’s regardless of how the service went.
In reality, what they’re trying to do, aside from genuinely checking up on what we thought of their service, is to also slip in a teeny tiny guilt trip on us so that we may feel bad giving our honest ratings to the survey (if they’re not good).
On the money thing, on one hand dealers/service department have every right to make as much money as they can, just like any business in America. On the other hand, I think the majority (not all, of course, there are some good dealers out there) are already swindling enough money out of customers’ hands during purchases.
Hey, I don’t mind paying a few extra bucks an hour for service, as long as that means the fellas working on my car are seeing at least some of it.
But for surveys, as I said up there – the burden of communicating how to fill out the survey as well as it’s importance should be on those conducting the survey, not on the service guys in the trenches. My former Toyota dealer used to do it on all levels, from the sales guy to the service guy. It drove me nuts. My fear is that it’ll get to that point with VW, where people will want to give negative feedback just to spite them.
And I love having a service department call to check up. It doesn’t happen enough.
Thanks for the comment Jeff.
I have a friend that works at one of the biggest travel websites online. They have this inane survey where it asks all these questions and the only answers allowed are “Did not meet expectations” / “Met expectations” / “Exceeded expectations”. If ANY of your answers on the survey are NOT “Exceeded,” then you “fail” the survey. If you have more than two “failed” surveys, then you’re eligible for discipline or termination.
My point being: surveys are crap. Most times, they’re designed by people who aren’t “in the field” with customers and don’t really understand customer feedback — they’re more about giving the marketing department something to tout.
A more logical way of assessing customer issues is simply to ask for customer complaints or praises, instead of having people answer vague questions. i.e.- “Anything we could have made better?” / “What did we do great?”
Mrad, I’d suggest just avoiding the survey altogether. If they ask, tell them you’d rather not bring their “points” down by answering anything below what they expected, so you’re just not going to answer it.
This sort of behavior is rampant within the auto industry. You experienced one of the mildest cases. I’m aware of dealers giving out gift certificates to people who’ll fill out the new car purchase survey in the sales manager’s office. Or that get downright nasty when they learn a customer didn’t give them perfect marks in a survey.
If they really want this process to work, they’ve got to lose the emphasis on compensation and work to engage in real dialogue on all levels, customer to dealer to manufacturer. If someone is really listening, customers will be more than happy to talk.
I think you’ve given me a future entry into my own blog…
Surveys are a bit flawed in nature I suppose. That’s way it sucks that they’re weighted so heavily. But this is something that I have seen get out of hand with with other brands, hence my concern with VW.
I just might take your advice there Jordan.
When I bought my Prius at Joseph Toyota, they told me I’d be receiving a survey in the mail in a few weeks. The salesmen said that this Dealership was a “Platinum” location because of the incredibly high marks they get on this survey. He then slipped in, “If there is anything on the survey that you are not going to score a 5 out of 5….call us and we’ll take care of it to make sure we remain at Platinum level.
Thanks for the assistance there buddy :-) you wanna also pay off this nice car loan for me too?
Ah yes, I know Joseph Toyota. Toyota is the worst for surveys – they stalk ya with calls, emails and traditional mailers. You’re best just to do it and be done with it. We used to go to Performance Toyota, who would pound their survey success into your head.
At least they phrased it nicely though.
On a scale of 1-10, 10 being highly recommended, a 9 or less is a failure to achieve perfection in the eyes of J.D. Power and Consumer Reports. These two entities judge the different automotive brands in sales as Initial Sales Satisfaction, in service as Service Satisfaction. The higher the different automotive brands score, the more highly recommended they are by JD Power and CR. Highly recommended brands hold their re-sale and trade in value better in the future.
I don’t like how these surveys work either, and I get judged by them and my pay is dependent upon them.
There are frankly some people in the world that could get the best sales experience, or the best service experience in the world, and still feel that nobody is perfect and deserves a “10″.
I don’t look at restaurant survey’s in the same light now because of how dealerships are judged. Restaurants are judged against Zagat, and there are some people that won’t go to a restaurant unless it’s highly rated by Zagat.
My 2-cents.
Peace people
We love you
Regarding surveys. I work as an appointment coordinator and also follow up with our service customers. I ask two questions. Did we address all of your concerns? Do you have any suggestions that could improve your next visit? It is then my responsibilty to act on the information our customers provide. At the end of the call, positive or negative, I let the customer know they may receive a survey and that it would be helpful to us for them to take a moment to answer that survey. No coaching, just an attempt to get feedback from customers.
See Chris, I’m fine with that. But when you (the “VW” you, not you personally) start telling me how I should format my answers, that’s when I start to get fired up.
Right, having surveys isn’t the issue alone. it’s the fact that they always preface the call with “we would love it if you gave us 9’s and 10’s on everything etc. etc. I will absolutely give 9’s and 10’s if they deserve it, but no need to encourage me to do so. This is a survey. The results should stand on their own. When they preface the call, they swing your mindset toward guilt if you give anything lower than their suggestion.
Absolutely keep the line of communication open between dealers and customers. But don’t try to “taint the waters” to your advantage. (your being the collective)
My VW (former) dealership called me and I asked if the work was completed. I responded truthfully that “no”, they could not make the radio “duplicate” the issue. An hour later, the service rep called me and ripped me a new butt saying that I had not right giving her a bad review and that her job depended on it.
I no longer take my VW Jetta to Lokey VW in Clearwater, Florida.
Matt – I completely understand your feeling about this and I agree. This is like a restaurant server wrapping up the meal by saying “I sure hope you can give me a big tip today” or a student saying to a teacher “I sure hope you can give me ‘A’ on this test”.
When you coach a customer on feedback, you’re not asking for true feedback. You’re asking for a favor. It’s that simple. And, customers are not there to do you a favor.
The way it works is: you do a good job and the customer offers you their feedback based on the experience you helped them have. Or they don’t. It’s not their job to help you. It’s their choice, if they want to.
And, to all the defenders of “survey coaching” I understand these folks are just trying to earn a living but that does not make it right.
When you ask a customer for good survey scores you are saying your focus is on you, not the customer. And the more you focus on what you want, the less likely you are to give the customer what they want.
Well said! Well said Kevin!!!