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A project to make businesses more aware of their customer experience, and how to fix it. By Mark Hurst. |
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Previous: (Just for fun) Culver's sign | Main | Next: New Yorker auto-responder email
June 22, 2007 12:03 AM
Broken: Honda dealership customer service email
Scott Sanders writes:
I contacted the Internet sales department at Bernardi Honda in Natick, Massachusetts because I wanted to check on the status of my car in the service department, and none of the phones in the dealership were working for whatever reason.
So I submitted an email via the Bernardi Honda website, and got a "personal thank you email" from Harvey which I pasted below:
Hi Scott,
I wanted to personally thank you for requesting information on a new Honda from Bernardi Honda Natick. This is an auto-response to confirm that we have received your request.
Harvey Rappaport from my Internet Sales Team will contact you very soon to answer all your questions and make you feel comfortable about doing business with Bernardi Honda. They can be reached directly at: (774) ..... Almost 40% of Bernardi Honda's customers choose to research their next Honda this way.
You are able to learn about models, new features and special discounts for being an Internet Customer. If there is anything I can do to help with your decision on a new Honda please contact me directly at any time.
Thanks again,
Harvey
Internet Sales Manager
Bernardi Honda
What is broken about this message is that it states that its intent is to "personally thank me" but then later in the message it informs me that the message is an auto-response.
Personal... auto-response... those two things don't go to together.
Harvey then goes on to talk about himself in the third person, informing me that Harvey will contact me soon.
Actually, Harvey never called me, nor did anyone from the service department. Instead, a woman who was at a very loud call center called me to ask me some survey questions.
[Note: I removed the actual phone number of the dealership. -mh]Hello, Tartan here. I personally think this is broken. Do not reply to this automatically generated message. Tartan will contact you later.
This is a common problem, where a business treats customers who come through the web like second-class citizens. I am sure that it's entirely unintentional, but it's amazing how common this problem is.
When I find a business on the web that lets me do something through their site (contact, schedule, etc), I generally do not expect good results unless they are a computer- or Internet-related business. For other types of businesses, I just use the phone.
I'm not available at the moment. This is an auto response from my SG59 Auto-commenter.
Hello SG59 here,
auto-counter says...
FOURTH
This is broken..but to defend the dealer a little here, dealers rely on CRM (customer relations management) tools that are not quite able to handle todays consumer demands. Many CRM tools only allow 1 auto responder. Since most of inquires coming form a dealer website are sales related, dealers build their autoresponder for the sales inquiry.
Sashazar said - "This is a common problem, where a business treats customers who come through the web like second-class citizens." Unfortunately you can somewhat correct, though not all dealers view it this way. As time moves forward this will change.
No doubt that someone from service should have called you after receiving your email request, but most dealers are just learning how to use the internet for customer relations. AND..since the internet, dealers are making less and less money but yet consumers are more and more demanding. This means the dealer has to hire more people to handle the extra demands. This is a challenge, especially for smaller dealers not making enough money to afford more employees.
"..it states that its intent is to "personally thank me" but then later in the message it informs me that the message is an auto-response..."
Technically, it only states that he "wanted" to. Apparently is being held hostage.
"Harvey then goes on to talk about himself in the third person, informing me that Harvey will contact me soon. "
No, different Harvey. It does not say the author of the letter is Harvey Rappaport.
MH: Please change the name of 'This is Broken' to 'This is Rationalized'. :D
@Jeff Kershner:
A poor customer experience is a poor customer experience regardless of the reason, and I'm not convinced the reasons you've put forward are particularly good.
Choosing a CRM tool that has only one auto-response can be mitigated by having different email addresses for sales, and service.
As for insufficient staffing to handle customer queries, if they can't cope with the realities of email, then perhaps they shouldn't be putting it forward as a contact mechanism on their website.
Comments on this entry are closed
Previous: (Just for fun) Culver's sign | Main | Next: New Yorker auto-responder email
I'd personally like to comment that this is broken. This is an auto-response to confirm that we have read your article.
Posted by: John Russell at June 22, 2007 01:42 AM