S ERV I CE D E PA R TME N T
Part 1: Tune Up Your Service Department
This is part 1 of a 3 part series on how to increase profits and customer satisfaction for service departments BY DA V ID V I S AGGI
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OR MANY FULL SERVICE FUEL DEALERS, THE SERVICE DEPARTMENT is the key to customer retention. Full service consumers worry about their house freezing or not having a hot show-
er. They are less worried about a run out than an unattended breakdown. It follows that the service department can impact customer loyalty by responding quickly, solving the problem in the first visit, and forecasting service costs accurately. Despite this opportunity to create a competitive advantage,
the service department is commonly treated as a necessary evil and a drain on the company, instead of a viable profit center. As a result many service departments are fraught with frustration and losses. It doesn't have to be that way. Here are some tips on how to increase profits and customer satisfaction.
REDUCE CALLBACKS By reducing callbacks you increase both your bottom line and cus- tomer satisfaction. The typical technician costs about $30,000 per year in wasted labor, parts, management time, and lost fuel accounts. A callback audit that identifies the problem technical areas and the struggling technicians will lead to effective solutions. Technical training is not enough. You need standard field
procedures. Wouldn't it be nice if you could get the same tune up from all your technicians? Wouldn't it be nice if all your technicians checked the same things as your best technician? It's possible. The chart shows the results of standardized procedures that were introduced in a callback reduction program.
SERVICE CALL RESPONSE TIME—EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS I once had a customer tell me that what he loved about our com- pany was that we showed up every time we said we would. That struck me as an odd complement. I was thinking, "Is that all I have to do to impress a customer? Just show up?" Obviously, you have to do more than that. You have to solve the problem. But the point remains that there are many competent service com- panies that don't schedule themselves well. If simply arriving on time exceeds the expectations of many customers, it follows that proper scheduling should be an easy opportunity to outperform the competition. A friend of mine would call that "low hanging
16 NOVEMBER 2011 | FUEL OIL NEWS | www.fueloilnews.com
