arggh… but thankfully …
Tuesday, September 26th, 2006Just a quick note to say hi & thanks for the sweet and neat comments.
Glad y’all liked the new drawing. I’ll make a promise to get back to the drawing board with more regularity. My writing muse has been scarce mostly due to an overwhelming and all consuming work load. There’s a couple more weeks in front of me that will have to have my undivided attention on matters other than the web. If the ‘gods’ are with me and our team, things will go the way they should.
Hey, here’s a little side note & follow up to my post about my car. 
I must say I like the evolution that seems to be happening just because my outlook and approach has shifted. Last year when I had encountered a significant frustration my response would have been irate and the outcome would have been fatigue, more frustration and regrets. For the last 5 months I have found that simply expressing my displeasure but not my anger has resulted in very different outcomes. Hotel upgrades are one benefit I’ve already shared, but guess what else happened just this week?
I was so distressed about the prospect of having to deal with the service guys at the dealership where I bought my car that I actually called ahead and begged them to promise me that all the work was done and my car was ready and that if I came mid day I could get in and out. I made an appointment to get my car back. I kept it. Did they? NO! I went there at 10 AM and at 12:08 I was still in the service office. Not only was the safety inspection not done, but they had totally lost the check that the claims guy had cut the week before. I had to ask if the tune up and 10,000 mile check I asked for (even though the car has barely 6,000 mile on it - it’s been on the road 2 years). I was asured it was and shown the technicians’time logs for each element of work done. They’d just not noticed the inspection on the work order. Nobody billed it, nobody did it. & I’d watched the techs come in and log the work they were doing on multiple cars during the time I was there.
So, I very quietly told the manager that I was really tired of being held hostage EVERY time I brought my car in to them. I told him that I really couldn’t afford to have to sit there for two hiurs after having called ahead to assure all was ready & I told him that I was really VERY tired of the lack of service interest offered customers once any vehicle purchase was final. I asked for a contact so I could communicate with volkswagen about my perceptions of the quality of service offered here. Sell me a car, make me happy about buying it, then when you’ve trapped me with a warrantee that is only valid if I use the ONLY approved service agent and allow that service agent to be shoddy is simply not going to fly.
They gave me the contact info, but they also wrote off every penny of my bill that was not covered by insurance. That’s more than a $400.00 discount on the billed amont by the way. Will that change what I have to say about their service ethic? I’m sorry but no. I must say that I would far rather pay exactly what I owe and experience a seemless, hassle free service experince. They get 99 % for service recovery in that I’ll trust that taking a hit in excess of 400 buck isn’t something they’ll let slide and will try and improve on… but I still expect some assurance that that performance improvement opportunity actually bear more fruit than giving random discounts to hassled and shafted customers.
I must say though that I am appreciative of how being quiet, reasonable and matter of fact about my perceptions and at the same time trying to be supportive of the challenges service providers face has resulted in me being offered fair and above and beyond treatment off the cuff - without prompting or demand.
Does getting a freebie on the repairs help me when it comes to procrastination about dealing with these people? Maybe. It’s possible that I’ll remember the relief that I was spared more than $400 in charges … or it’s possible I’ll remember just how helpless it felt to still be there at 12:47 (2 hours and 47 minutes after I got there way over three hours after calling to verify the car was ready to go and actually making an appointment to settle up and get my car.) and find that after being promised at 12:08 that my car was being driven around front for me “right now” my car was held up in a car wash line for 40 more minutes and yet somehow NEVER got washed.
I left work at 9:50 after calling to assure all was ready & it was little more than an in and out process, I got back to work just before1PM. They had my car and all the significant and incidental work orders for 13 days.
Why do I procrastinate over seemingly simple things like car maintenance & service? Guess. My honest question is why does it have to be like this? It’s always been like this. ALWAYS. In Canada, In KY, in TX in OR … every where I’ve ever lived long enough to need car maintenance….
Boy do I need a spanking….& it’s coming. In your silent wishes for me to get that, would you take a second to ask the fates to remind me that I said that while I’m getting it please. I know I’m going to forget and beg for a lesser intervention when the reality *hits.*.
TY
Love
patty
