First UK garage signs up with Euro Repar Car Service
Published: 11 October, 2017
Nicholson’s Stalham Engineering, based in Norfolk , has become the first British business to become a Euro Repar Car Service Centre.
Nathan Culley from Nicholson’s said: “We’re a well-established family business with a great local reputation. People know us, and they trust us. Now, they also know we have the backing of a great European network, with all the advantages and opportunities that brings us. It can only help us to grow, and provide an even better local service.”
A family business established in 1938, the business offers a range of automotive, agricultural and garden machinery services including new and used sales, servicing and repairs, as well as full garage forecourt facilities.
Euro Repar Car Service, supported operationally by PSA Groupe, announced its arrival in the UK in April, and aims to add around 600 UK independent garages to its network by 2020.
It currently works with more than 2,500 facilities across France, Spain, Italy, Germany and The Netherlands. The minimum requirement is two manned ramps, and a separate reception.
Colin Start, head of marketing for parts and service for the PSA Groupe said: “We believe that success relies on our partner garages retaining the personality, reputation and trust they have in the local area. Combining that with the wealth of experience and support we can offer will help them take the next step.”
- Dealing with customer complaints
Running any business, and perhaps more so a service business like an independent garage, you have to learn to recognise there are different types of customers with different expectations.
How we deal and adapt our services, the customer journey to meet and exceed these expectations are essential if we are going to succeed in having a healthy profitable business. This function must be adopted by everyone in your garage regardless of size.
Occasionally however, we are faced with challenging customers who complain, usually in a passive aggressive manner. These customers feel they have a reason to be upset. I always used to say to my team at Brunswick Garage, that there will always be a small percentage of customers that we will never be able to please, and importantly we must not let these handful of customers taint our view of all customers. When you find yourself having to deal with a disgruntled customer, remembering a few simple techniques can help to defuse the situation. Both parties being upset and defensive will not amount to anything positive.
Listen
In my experience running independent garages, I came to the realisation that in virtually every case of an unhappy customer, all that was needed to resolve the customer concern was to listen to the customer, or recognise actually they weren’t being listened to.
The customer isn’t always right, but it’s not always okay to tell them that, sometimes you have to act as if they are right. Active listening, eye contact, nodding your head in agreement, being on the same level with them, expressing empathy, and relating to how the customer is feeling can be incredibly helpful. Remember to place yourself in the customer’s position or frame of mind and never patronise a customer or look for excuses. We are working in an industry where many aspects of the customer journey have to come together from the initial phone call to returning the customers vehicle keys, so we have to accept that sometimes things go wrong however much we try to avoid mistakes.
Rapport
Once you have been able to establish some rapport, you may find a mutually agreeable resolution to the problem, and you must do whatever you can to achieve this outcome. Explain to the customer what you are going to do to help the situation. It could be engaging the customer in a test drive to better understand the complaint, admitting the garage made a mistake, or if possible, offering the customer a lift back home, work or a loan vehicle while you resolve their issue. You must assure at all times the customer feels that you are truly trying your best to resolve their concern and provide them with the least convenience as possible.
Research indicates that customers prefer the person they are speaking with to instantly solve their problem. However sometimes complaints have to be moved up the chain of command, but make sure they don’t add to the customer's frustration. So, wherever possible, resolve the issue yourself. This has the added advantage of demonstrating to those senior to you that you are willing to manage difficult situations yourself without resorting to escalation.
If you really can’t solve the customers concerns, take ownership of the issue and ensure that the complaint is effectively escalated and that you follow up to see what the outcome is.
It’s also worth mentioning that if you say you are going to do something, you should always do it. Don’t be tempted to tell customers that someone will get in touch with them in an hour when they might not get a call for a few hours. The customer won’t thank you for it in the long run. Always be sure you can meet the promise you make.
Perspective
Many of us have worked in the automotive sector for so long we forget what it is like to bring our vehicle for repair. Knowing what your competition is doing can also pay dividends in other ways too. It can help you set yourself apart by creating a business experience, an atmosphere that is different from any other garage locally and far beyond.
Keeping perspective when it comes to the customer experience will help you to create a positive customer experience and maintain a solid customer base. At Brunswick Garage we were of course never happy to receive complaints, however we used it as a prompt to better our service and if a customer made the effort to write or email us with a concern, we displayed their comments in reception with the thank you letters. We wanted to show our customers that we were not perfect, but also show them we took complaints very seriously and we always aimed at achieving a positive outcome. Learning to handle challenging customers will build respect for your business and ultimately result in higher customer retention and profits.
Positive/negative
When we receive complaints, we often look upon them in a negative way. However, complaints can be really useful to any garage and although it doesn’t feel like it at the time, the complaint is extremely positive in that it helps highlight problems with our service and procedures.
The alternative to receiving customer complaints is not receiving them and carrying on just the way we are, oblivious the negative impact our actions are having on customers who perhaps won’t return or will be complaining to their friends rather than to us. This is extremely damaging as we never get the chance to put right the errors that we don’t hear about. It’s a bit of a cliché, but complaints really are a gift.
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- Avoiding the ‘seven deadly sins’
We have all witnessed the ‘buggers muddle’ that has seen the UK Parliament struggling to find a solution to the challenge of Brexit. By the time you are reading this in December, the general election will be upon us. However, this also showed how difficult it is to align different stakeholder views and there were many instances where some cardinal sins were evident in trying to find solutions. What happened in Parliament would never work in a business environment. So, what are the ‘deadly sins’ to avoid in the management of a day to day business.
Each of these ‘seven deadly sins’ probably deserve an article in their own right, but I hope to provide some form of thought provoking ‘sins’ that you need to consider directly in relation to you and your business.
Firstly, and most importantly, be really honest with yourself and see how these seven key areas apply to you.
1. Don’t be a busy fool!
How easy it is to fall into this trap. Often, in a futile attempt to keep business costs to a minimum, it leads to you getting bogged down in the day-to-day issues and fire-fighting. There's less and less time to step back, plan for the future, anticipate problems and manage the business, which then hit as the cycle starts again. You must make time to manage the business, not just run it.
In addition, guilt about the lack of ‘quality’ time spent with friends and family can compound the issue and in extreme cases can lead to exhaustion and collapse.
Many business owners kid themselves that everything is OK and only start to hire staff or outsource when the cracks are beginning to show. By then it can already be too late. So, get additional help early on.
2. How do you know what you don't know?
You know what you are good at and that has allowed your business to start and develop. To really drive the business forward will also involve finding clients, marketing, recruiting and motivating staff and managing cash flow and developing systems and procedures, plus a whole lot more.
It is unlikely that any one business owner knows everything he needs to know.
Learn to recognise where your skills and knowledge fall short and take action to remedy this gap in your business. Be clear about what precise help you need, what objective it will lead to being fulfilled and the relevant expertise you need to hire in.
3. Trying to grow too fast and too soon
You will obviously have a great passion and belief in your business. So, you gear up by expanding staff and premises - only to have to cut back as the anticipated increase in business turned out to be a false projection.
Every business needs working capital and as the business increases so does the working capital requirement. If cash is tied up in stock or in covering debtors that owe money, then the company runs the risk of running out of cash. This is a well recognised phenomenon and you need to plan accordingly – especially with your bank and accountant.
Make sure you plan for any expansion – don’t celebrate the increase in business and then blame the banks for pulling the plug just when things are picking up. The reality is you need to sit down with your accountant and bank and discuss the need for funding several months in advance to avoid any panic requests.
Additionally, as the business grows, it is critical that you allow for the introduction of the appropriate systems and procedures, so you don't end up being sucked into fire fighting as the business grows, meaning you spend more time working in the business and less time working on it.
4. Who can you talk to?
Many garages are too small to have a proper Board or even a Non-Executive Director. It would be inappropriate to talk to staff about some issues and often partners and friends just don't ‘get it’. External advisors may have only a narrow focus or worse still have their own agenda, so business owners end up marooned on their own little island.
This can be very damaging. Talking things through with others is important as it often provides new ideas and perspectives or can simply endorse your view reassuring you that you are heading the right way. Business breakfast clubs can work well or develop a small network of people you can trust and use them to talk things through and get their input.
5. Don’t employ another you!
Many business owners employ people who are similar to themselves - so the skills gaps are not actually filled. It's also common for recruitment to be left until the last minute and so a decision is made in haste, to be regretted at leisure!
This leads to problems being overlooked, references are not checked, or business partners are not consulted. Also remember, no matter how good someone is, if there is a difference in their work ethics and values, then the only questions will be "When will the row happen?" and "On what subject will it be?" before they leave or you have to fire them.
6. Who are you?
Many business owners refuse to face their fears and insecurities, often because they don't want to appear stupid or expose a lack of knowledge. They don't trust other people and want to hold on to everything themselves because they believe no one can do it as well as they can. Ultimately this means they are less able to build an appropriate team around them.
Be brutally honest with yourself, about your strengths and weaknesses and their impact on others.
Ensure that you know how to be a great delegator. Learn how to delegate, motivate and communicate with your staff – it is a key man management skill and avoid just dumping or micro-managing.
7. Make a new circle around you
Who's challenging you and testing your business development strategy? Get out of your comfort zone. Very often business owners surround themselves with people from the same sector. The thinking goes something like; ‘unless you've been man and boy in my sector for 50 years – you couldn't possibly have anything to contribute.’ This may apply in some situations, but innovation comes from picking up ideas from outside ‘conventional thinking’. Mixing with others will increase your chances of doing this.
By avoiding these ‘seven deadly sins’, your business has a far greater chance of not just surviving, but thriving.
Take a look at each of these areas and ask yourself some tough questions - and be honest with yourself! Your answers and the resulting actions you take could make all the difference to your future wealth, health and happiness.
xenconsultancy.com
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