Chris Collins moderates a Q&A where a Chevy service manager seeks ways to speed up extended service contract processing. Panelists recommend centralizing warranty calls to one person, preparing a standardized info sheet with contract and part numbers, batching calls together, and treating warranty reps well to get faster approvals.
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Okay, let's go to today's question.
Hello, I'm a service manager at a Chevy dealership in the Northeast. I wanted to get your take on how to more efficiently navigate service contracts, because that seems to be primarily the work we're receiving. It drags everybody down, takes a lot of time. I don't know if you guys had a more efficient way to possibly navigate that, to increase everyone's efficiency. Thank you.
Well, one way to do it is to have administrator doing the claims. So oftentimes, like, you can create a sheet that explains what, you know, the policy number, who the extended warranty is. I'm guessing you're using the same warranty over and over again. All of the pertinent information, the parts and what they are, the total, the labor, what needs to be done, all kind of on. On a sheet. And then.
You can have administrators call and get the work approved.
So it means that the car is coming in. You're doing kind of a different process in the sense that you're gonna have a diagnostic team or you're gonna. The tech is gonna diagnose it, pull it out, you're gonna get the claim approved, and then pull it back in. So it takes a little longer to turn the vehicle around, but. But it makes the advisors and techs more efficient if there's an administrator, because the advisors can't. You know, it's really hard to be on the phone, call people, back, write up new customers, all that. So creating kind of a part of your warranty administration, that is. That is doing that. And usually one person can do quite a few claims in a day.
Ideally, is if you have one person doing the claims and they can do multiple at one time, where you hash out, like, two or three on one call. That's super efficient.
Yeah, that's great. I remember when I was an advisor, I'd get there early and call because they were always open on the East Coast. So if I got there at 5, I could call. They usually would take like 40 minutes. You're on hold forever. They almost make it like some of the warranty companies make it impossible. The other thing is, if you're selling one warranty.
You can usually make some sort of deal with the warranty company that you have a back door or you, you know, somehow your calls get in a little bit quicker. I've done that before too. Just saying, like, hey, we're not going to sell this anymore if we have to be on hold for 40 minutes. Yeah, that's not possible.
That's a good point. I also have a couple other things written down here too. It's kind of along that line of, of longevity. And I write down pet the dog with the person answering the phone because I think that what happens in a lot of cases, those people on the other end of the claim are getting yelled at. They're getting, you know, guff from advisors because the advisor has been on the hold for 25 minutes. And like, it's probably not a really pleasant thing for them. So I think stopping and just being really, really nice to them. And I also, I wrote down all the stuff you did. Contract number, customer name, labor dollars, parts dollars, part numbers, tax. You want to have the whole thing all set out. I would say that probably the most common reason why extended warranty claims take a really long time once you get through to somebody is, is because it's disorganized. And I'll see them say they'll want to, you know, they'll call and then the service contract company will ask for something that they ask for every single time, but we don't have it. So then we got to call them back, which is another, you know, 25 minutes of hold purgatory. I think that your idea about having an administrator do the phone call, because the majority of it is time on hold, once you get through to somebody, the thing goes pretty fast.
Yeah, it's good. Cool. Well, I hope, I hope that helps. Thanks for the call. We'll send you a swag bag. Remember, 8333-Ask SDR if you have a question. We would love to, to hear it and help you out. And we'll see you next time on Service Drive Revolution.
Thanks for watching this week's Drive By. I hope we gave you something to think about over the weekend. We're uploading new stuff every day, so. So make sure you subscribe and click the Bell icon so you don't miss out. If you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show. Call 8333-ASK SDR and we'll answer your question on the show. That's 8333-ASK SDR. For special deals on our books and training, head over to offers.chriscollinsinc.com now that's offers.chriscollinsInc.com I'm Chris Collins and and I'll see you in the next video.
