What do we mean when we ask, “Can you speak “Automobile” fluently? Well, much of the answer depends on whom you ask, but for the most part, the “Automobile” language is somewhat complex in the sense that it is made up of different variations, or dialects. For instance, the dialect mechanics and technicians speak revolves around the need to fix cars right the first time, while service advisors, who represent a different population group in most workshops, speak a language that revolves around the need to garner as much business per work order as they can.
Somewhere in the middle live the customers, who more often than not, cannot understand a single word mechanics or service advisors utter. Sadly, this fact often results in customers speaking a dialect of the “Automobile” language that often includes words and terms that both mechanics and service advisors find strange, if not downright offensive. There are many examples of the dialect our customers speak, but the words “rip-off”, “incompetent”, “ignorant”, “unskilled”, and “a bunch of grease monkeys” are common, while terms like “great service”, perfect service” and “will return” are heard much less commonly.
So what does any of the above mean? You may well ask because although we, as mechanics and technicians have a responsibility to ensure that our customer's vehicles always leave our care in better condition than when we received them, we cannot do this alone. We need the active and sustained support of service advisors, who have the responsibility of ensuring that we, the mechanics and technicians, receive unambiguous instructions on work orders written in a language that we understand.
While the above might come across as a self-evident truth, the fact is that in a great many workshops, mechanics and service advisors speak two dialects of the same langue that are often so different from each other that they do not intersect at a common goal, which is to always act in the best interests of our customers.
The result of such miscommunications and misunderstandings are often not only very unpleasant and difficult to resolve but often also cause severe and long-lasting reputational damage to a repair business and everybody working in it. Thus, in this article, we will look at ways that service advisors, which are the first point of contact between a repair business and the motoring public, can interpret or translate the language that mechanics and technicians speak into a dialect of the “Automobile” language that customers can understand. Before we get to specifics, though, let us provide some context for this article by recounting (the short version of) an example of-
When this writer was recently invited by the manager of a large independent workshop to consult on a no-start condition on a 7-Series BMW, he was a reluctant witness to the tail end of a vicious verbal altercation between a service advisor and the owner of a high-end Mercedes SUV that had been worked on the day before.
The gist of the matter was this: the customer was under the impression that the brake fluid in the vehicle would be replaced as a part of the comprehensive brake inspection and brake pad replacement he had paid for. It turned out that the service advisor told the customer that dirty brake fluid is always replaced during such inspections. However, since the work order did not state “Replace Brake Fluid”, the responsible technician did not replace the brake fluid.
So, based on the service advisor’s statement that the brake fluid would be replaced, the customer now wanted the brake fluid replaced, because according to him (the angry customer) the brake fluid in the master cylinder was “..still as black as tar”.
The service advisor's response to this demand was, however, that the customer could not possibly have expected "champagne service on a beer budget" (or words to that effect) which enraged the customer to the point where a second service advisor threatened to call the police to have the customer removed from the building. This was followed by threats of legal action by both sides on a wide range of grounds, some of which may have been valid on both sides.
This writer had lived through many miscommunications and misunderstandings between his front office staff and customers, and although he has never believed that customers are always right in all such cases*, no matter the circumstances, there are always ways and means to resolve disputes to everybody's satisfaction that do not involve threats of legal action.
* During his more than four decades in the car repair industry, this writer has also lived through and survived a great many instances of the “Ever since you…” swindle that some customers seem to get by on.
The whole thing was extremely unpleasant to witness but the point is this: the altercation could have been avoided if the service advisor had managed the customer’s expectations with some professionalism during their initial interaction. In this instance, the service advisor created an expectation in the mind of the customer and instead of (belatedly)meeting that expectation by apologising to the customer and arranging to have the brake fluid replaced as promised, he simply fobbed off the customer, who, it must be said, was perfectly willing to pay for the brake fluid replacement, which begs this question-
All, or at least many of us, have been in a position where something may have been our fault but wasn't when the facts and circumstances of an issue are viewed objectively. However, the human condition is a fickle and fragile thing, and so what might be seen as an objective assessment of a set of facts/circumstances by one party might appear as solid evidence of guilt/negligence/laziness when viewed from a different perspective. Let us explore this proposition briefly-
Should the responsible technician have replaced the brake fluid as a part of the comprehensive brake inspection? Perhaps, but seeing that-
Based on the above, the technician made a note on the work order* that the customer should arrange a booking to have the water-contaminated brake fluid replaced as soon as possible.
* This was confirmed by the responsible technician during an unrelated consultation a few weeks later during a consultation that happened a few weeks later.
Based on the service advisor's response to the customer's complaint, it was clear that this service advisor, who, it later turned out, did not have a mechanical background, saw the situation from an opposed position. According to his view,
So, there we have it; a perfect, real-life example of two different population groups living in a busy upmarket car repair facility that speak two different dialects of the same language. In fact, in this example, the two dialects reflect the fact that neither the technician nor the service advisor, are almost certainly not aware of (or understands) the real-world pressures and time constraints that define the roles and responsibilities of each population group within the workshop’s ecosystem.
Translated, the above means that-
The practical effect of these kinds of situations is that customers often do not have their expectations met, but it is not the intention of this article to apportion blame for the fact this customer’s expectations were not met or acknowledged. Sometimes, things just go wrong; service advisors get work orders wrong, or mechanics and technicians misinterpret instructions or worse, skip, or miss some instructions. Most of us have been in such situations, and often because customers generally speak neither service advisors' dialect of "Automobile", nor technicians' version of the same language.
In the real world, customers often do not know what they want or need, and so it falls to service advisors to define customers’ needs and wants in terms that make sense to mechanics and technicians, who often do not have the opportunity to speak to customers on a face-to-face basis about the concerns and issues they have with their vehicles. Therefore, mechanics and technicians often go into a job blind, with only what is written on the work order to guide them to a resolution of a customer’s concerns, so let us look at-
NOTE: It is not the intention of this article to question or cast aspersions on the abilities, skills, and integrity of service advisors in general- far from it. Service advisors are a vitally important link in the structure of any competent workshop, and as such, much of the success and profitability of busy workshops can be directly ascribed to the skills and professionalism of the service advisors in these workshops.
However, having said the above, it must also be said that this writer had owned and operated a highly successful workshop for more than 30 years, during which time he'd had plenty of time to observe the tactics and methods of his team of service advisors. As a general rule, service advisors with mechanical backgrounds, or those who’d been mechanics themselves, usually (but not always) raised higher value work orders than service advisors who did not have mechanical backgrounds. Therefore, based on this writer’s first-hand observations, having a mechanical background is not necessarily a prerequisite for being a successful and effective service advisor.
Nonetheless, knowing how cars work certainly helps to interpret the sometimes vague and often incomplete information that customers often provide to service advisors regarding the complaints/concerns/issues they experience with their vehicles. Conversely, if you do not a) know how modern cars work, and b) do not fully understand that customers do not always know exactly what they are experiencing in terms of symptoms, it becomes much more difficult to ask the kinds of questions that can help you to define the problem or reduce it to its simplest form. Let us look at one example-
A customer approaches you and tells you their car won’t start but since no-start conditions come in many forms, with each having different causes and fixes, you can define the problem quickly by asking the right questions, such as-
These are just some examples of questions you might want to ask but in practice, the answers to the above questions will help you translate the customer's vague or incomplete description of their concern into a dialect of the “Automobile” language a mechanic or technician can understand. Put in another way, asking the right questions right at the beginning of an interaction with a customer will always give you, and the technician who will work on the no-start condition, the right answer(s).
With the above in mind, we also know and realise that many car owners see car maintenance costs as "grudge" expenses. In practice, although many car owners have no clue about the maintenance requirements of modern vehicles, they will defer some types of preventative maintenance for as long as they can because "their cars are still running fine".
This kind of attitude often makes it much more difficult for service advisors always to act in customers' best interests because many customers believe they are being ripped off or worse, are forced into some preventative maintenance procedures by service advisors' scare tactics. If you have been a service advisor for an appreciable period, you will no doubt have encountered customers who “refuse to be bullied into spending money on their cars they do not have to spend”.
If on the other hand, you have only begun your career as a service advisor, you might be tempted to say something like “…If you don’t have this coolant leak right fixed right now, it will be much more expensive to fix if your engine blows up", which is the worst possible thing you can say to a customer- who is likely on a budget.
This kind of response is extremely counter-productive, and it will almost certainly not result in a sale simply because most customers see it as a scare tactic, which might well be illegal in some contexts. So, how do you, as a new service advisor, persuade a client who might not be regular, that you are not planning to rip him off by making a minor coolant leak look worse than it is?
We suggest you take the following approach-
Then, we suggest that you ask the following questions, but not necessarily in this order-
We are certainly not trying to teach you your job but this writer's many experiences with difficult clients have proven over the years that this approach and the kinds of questions you ask will almost always persuade (most) difficult clients that you know what you are talking about, which takes you a long way towards making a sale.
This approach, which incidentally works for almost any complaint or concerns a customer might have, will also do three more things-
Of course, we all have our own ways of doing things, and some of these may work better for some of us than for others, but one thing that is common to all successful service advisors is that they take a neutral approach to customers' concerns.
In this context, “neutral” is not synonymous with “disinterest” or a “know-it-all” attitude towards customers and their concerns. In this context, a neutral approach means that you-
Despite what we think of how little many customers know about their vehicles, most customers have highly developed BS radars, and they will take their business elsewhere in a flash if they detect even a hint of dishonesty or unprofessional conduct at any point during their initial contact with a workshop.
Very often, this means that since you, as a service advisor, are almost always the first point of contact between a prospective customer and the workshop or company, you are also the face of the workshop or company. In practice, this means that customers will generally extend their impression of you and your conduct to the business as a whole.
As a practical matter, this means that if you go about your job in a professional manner, the rest of the staff, including the mechanics and technicians, will also do their jobs professionally. Of course, this leaves us with the question of whether your command of the “Automobile” language is as good as you think it is or more to the point; whether you think that both customers and technicians always understand your dialect of the language.
We hope that this article has given you some new insights into your role as a service advisor, and how your approach to that role could potentially affect customers’ expectations as a result of technicians not always being sure of what customers’ concerns and needs may be.
In this regard, it is worth repeating that service advisors play a critical role not only in the structure of a car repair business but also in its competitiveness and ultimate profitability. Seasoned service advisors are acutely aware of this, but this point of awareness takes many years to achieve. However, dedication, professionalism, and always paying attention to detail will get you there too: are you up for the challenge?
