Chris Collins and a panel advise a service advisor who moved to a small-town dealership struggling with poor systems like extended loaner policies and inconsistent charge accounts. Build your own client base, network locally, and work within the chaos while pushing the dealer to fix what's broken.
What kind of jokes or what kind of questions?
God Speechless today.
To the voice of God, Every question is a joke in and of itself.
It is funny watching you tiny humans fret. Question number one. Hello, Chris. I recently switched dealerships to be closer to home. I'm a service advisor and have been one for about 10 years. I. I'm having a hard time fitting in at the new dealership. It's a small town atmosphere in a very relaxed environment. The two biggest things that I can't get my head around is letting customers have loaner vehicles for extended periods of time for simple repairs. While we have to turn down other customers due to not having courtesy transportation. Then we're being told that the department is not profitable, but told to let the customer have a loaner for five days for an oil change in detail. My mind will not ignore that we're losing money on that transportation and big picture, we're missing opportunities on other vehicles due to not having a vehicle available for major repairs. My next concern is dealership charge accounts. They tell us to not let customers have a tab at the dealership. But then as soon as the customer talks to management, they fold and let them do an internal charge, sometimes up to a $10,000 repair. Then when the customer misses payments or doesn't pay, the the writer gets blamed. It also makes the writer come off as the bad guy and the manager come off as the hero just by the writer following policy. Any advice on what I should do?
I have. I have a couple things I'd like to say on this, but I'll let Chris go first.
Have your dealer call us and we'll set up a strategy session. If you lose, they're losing money. That's the first thing.
It sounds like chaos over there. I mean, there's just no systems in place. It's just kind of, you know, like you said, small town, right? Kind of just like mom and pop. The first thought I wrote down is they're using their loaners as a crutch. So the loaner becomes a crutch for, you know, lack of execution within the shop. So get over the loaner thing. Just, you know, get your own. Let them do what they're going to do. It's interesting listening to that whole story is it's he switched dealerships or he or she switched dealerships to be closer to home. And now it's kind of like they want to plug into the system and just let that system feed them. So don't complain that their system is broken. Go create your own little Business within this business. Right. So go out and get your own customers, create your own client base and, you know, do the business you'd want to do it. Don't worry about the dealership charge account. Let them do what they're going to do. Go out and find your own clients and build your own little business and within two or three years you'll have a rocking business.
Yeah.
What's great about little markets or little towns like that is if you go to the local restaurant for lunch and make friends and go to any event and really, really talk to customers and get to know them, they're. They're the most loyal. Word travels fast. You become the service advisor of record for that town. If so, I don't know. I would go practice charisma and networking and get out and about and meet people and the system. You know, like you said, get us on with the deal and we'll try to help with the systems on our end because it just sounds like the systems are broken. There isn't a real plan. They're doing the best they can, but they don't understand there's a better way. But man, what better than the right service in a little town and know everybody.
You get to be the mayor of the town.
You go to the grocery store and they know you. Like everybody's a potential client. It's the greatest.
It is.
Did you have anything that, any jokes to add to that?
No, I, I thought that was actually a really good. Well written. By the way, if the service advisor thing doesn't work out, critiquing, we could be an author, right?
Really?
I thought that was really well written.
Well, I only got lost three times during it.
Yeah, you're not a victim. That's what I would say.
Yeah.
Oh, and if you're in a state where you can buy a Glock, go buy a Glock.
Thank you so much for watching this clip of Service Drive Revolution. Now you can catch the full episode on YouTube, iTunes or Spotify or wherever you consume your podcast. If you have any questions, go ahead and post them in the comments below. Make sure you subscribe and hit the bell icon so you're notified when we post new episodes. I'm Chris Collins and you can find me on Facebook and Instagram at Chris Collins, Bulldog Collins. And I'll see you again on the next episode.
