Does it pay to shop around - You betcha!
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This little snippet of information I find both amusing and in a way bloody annoying.
My sister-in-law recently had trouble with her VT Commodore. It has been stalling on the odd occasion and starting again straight away. I checked the computer for fault codes and it gave us a code 49, indicating a fault in the Crank Angle Sensor or Cam Angle Sensor. Seeing as though the symptoms pointed to a faulty Crank Angle Sensor I suggested she have it replaced. With two slipped discs in my back I wasn’t going to put my hand up for this job.
I went down and bought the part for her from our local Repco and she started ringing around to see if she could get it done that day. First of all she rang the Holden dealerships around our area. We have two within around 20km of each other and they are both owned by the same person.
Dealership number one wanted fifty dollars but couldn’t do it until the following Tuesday - it was a Friday and she didn’t want her weekend ruined by a dodgy car. Dealership number two, remember this is owned by the same person, wanted eighty five dollars and could do it as soon as she could get the car there!! When quizzed about the price difference the reason given was that this particular dealership was losing money and needed to charge more!
I’ll tell you why they are losing money, they just bought the block of land across the road and turned it into a Used Car lot and the old Used Car lot now has a nice new showroom going up on it. Losing money my butt, spending money more like it and of course it’s the end consumer that foots the bill. I felt some satisfaction in knowing that they were obviously not very busy as they could do the car straight away, maybe word is getting around and before they know it they will be losing money, for no other reason than their own greed.
By the way she did get her car fixed that day, at a small local Auto Electrician for the grand total of fourty dollars. I realise that getting upset over fourty-five dollars is a bit petty, but what has happened to customer satisfaction and charging a reasonable amount for the work that is done? Is it right that the customer bears the brunt of changes in a business or is it right that the customer pays the going rate for the job they are getting done?
My way of thinking is to keep the customers happy and keep them coming back, save up your pennies and expand when you can afford it. We will never use that particular dealership again and I know of several other people that have spent big dollars down there and will never go back. Maybe they are just too big to care and the amount they may lose from less cars in the workshop is a pittance compared to what they will make out of the new car sales areas but again I have to say ‘what about keeping your customers happy’, does anyone care about this these days?
Anyway that feels better now! I have had my rant for the day. If you too have a problem with the way business is done these days please feel free to leave a comment, I’m sure that I am not the only one in this world that thinks things are going to the dogs!
Craig
